


Criminal

by thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: AU, Abuse memories, Angst, Electrocution, Fluff, Gen, Mystery, POV Lance (Voltron), PTSD, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2020-12-17 02:21:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 33,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21046712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey/pseuds/thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey
Summary: New school, new rules. Lance is a "criminal" at a boarding school designed to "reform" him. He gets along with two of his new classmates, Hunk and Pidge, but the other one... Well, let's just say that Lance would be perfectly glad if Keith Kogane were to suddenly be transferred to literally anywhere else. Preferably prison. But something sinister is going on in the school's forbidden hallway, and Lance will need all of the allies he can get to figure it out. And hopefully not die in the process.





	1. Chapter 1

Lance bounced around on the Greyhound bus he'd been thrown on, looking for someone to sit next to. He didn't have many options: there were only three other people on the bus, not including the bus driver. A big boy with dark skin and dark hair held out of his face with a headband, a short girl with short, brown hair, and another boy with violet eyes and dark hair in—was that a mullet?

Lance tried the mullet-boy first, since he was the closest to the door. "Hey, is anyone—"

Mullet-boy swung his feet up onto the open seat next to him. "This spot's taken."

Lance put his hands on his hips, immediately rankled by this kid. "Yeah? By who?"

"My feet. Go away." Mullet-head put in earbuds and started to pointedly ignore him, looking out the window.

Lance pulled a grotesque face. "This spot's tAkeN," he muttered in a bad imitation of mullet-head.

The bigger boy waved to him. "Don't take it personally! He did the same to me!"

Lance plopped down in the seat next to the big boy. "Hi! I'm Lance."

"Hunk," the other boy said, and pointed to the girl, who was typing away on a laptop. "That's Katie, but she prefers Pidge."

The girl gave him a friendly nod, and went back to her computer.

"As far as I can tell, the surly kid's name is Keith. Mostly from the person at his bus stop yelling at him to 'behave and don't get kicked out, for the stars sake, because they didn't want him back'."

"Yikes."

"Yep. Keith flipped him off, though, so I think the feeling is mutual."

"_Yikes_."

Hunk smiled warmly. "Enough about him. How come _you're _getting shipped off?"

"Class clown. A few counts of minor theft. But mostly for doing dumb, against-the-rules stuff."

"Such as?"

"Taking the principal's car for a joyride," Lance said with a grin, "But to be fair, I was double-dog dared, and a friend had money on me that I would."

"Understandable."

"The principal didn't seem to think so. What are _you _doing here?"

Hunk shrugged his massive shoulders passively. "I broke into the school kitchen one too many times, I guess."

"_Nice_. But I didn't think that school food was good enough to break into the kitchen to steal."

"It's not, and I wasn't. I was trying to cook a decent lunch for the school."

Lance held a hand up. "Double points for that."

Hunk obligingly high-fived him, and Lance turned his head towards Pidge.

"Internet fraud," she said before he could ask, "Hacking, stealing people's internet identities, messing with the school mainframe and setting up a few internet scams." She looked up at him. "I thought I'd tell you before you had to ask."

"Yikes. So you're like an actual criminal!"

"Yeah. And Hunk actually got sent off because he burned the chemistry lab to the ground."

Hunk grinned sheepishly as Lance's head whipped around to face him. "That was an accident. At least breaking into the kitchens was on purpose."

"What about Keith?" Lance asked.

"A long history of violence towards people who ask nosy questions," Keith responded, now laying across the seat with his legs up against the wall of the bus and his head poking out briefly to glare at Lance. The earbuds were dangling.

Lance glared back. "What is your _problem_?!"

"Ignore him," Hunk sighed, "He just doesn't want to talk to us."

Keith's head disappeared from view, his earbuds back in his ears. Lance pulled another face. "Woooooow. Look who's Mr. Mysterious edgy-mcedgelord. Could you have picked a response any more threatening?"

There was no response, and Lance assumed that Keith had stopped listening. He gave up. "Good _Lord_. If I'm in any classes with him, I'm either going to kill him or myself, and I'm leaning towards the former."

Hunk nudged his shoulder. "Hey, maybe he's not so bad. You've got to get to know a person before you can judge them, right?"

"I don't _want _to get to know him," Lance grumbled, "Do you know how much longer it'll be until we get there?"

"Approximately ten seconds until the main gate," Pidge responded before Hunk could answer, "Last chance for anyone to bust a window and run away."

Lance pressed his face against the window. "Hey, how long have _you _guys been on the bus?" He himself had only been there for a few minutes, but his family lived in the country.

"An hour," Pidge said with a sigh, "Hunk and I got on at the same time. Keith showed up about fifteen minutes later."

Hunk frowned. "Why are we so far from civilization?"

"So that no one will hear our screams," Lance said dramatically.

"So that our bad habits and rule-breaking tendencies won't spread to the good, law-abiding folks of the civilized world," Pidge responded sarcastically.

The bus stopped inside of a massive, gated complex. "Welcome to your new home," the bus driver said in a tired, bored voice, "please exit the bus and pick up your luggage."

Keith was off in an instant, and Lance was only seconds behind. He grabbed his suitcase and his duffle bag and waited for Hunk, who had two suitcases, and Pidge, who had a suitcase, a duffle bag, and a backpack that looked suspiciously like it held only computer things. Keith had a singular duffle bag, and he clutched it tightly, looking like he knew the routine.

"Welcome to Galra Juvenile Correctional Facility," a smooth female voice said.

Lance turned to see who'd spoken, and barely kept his jaw from dropping. Holy stars. She was _gorgeous_. She had dark skin offset by bright blue eyes, and her long, curly hair was dyed a striking white. She couldn't have been much older than them—fresh out of college, probably. She smiled at them all politely, consulting a checkboard.

"My name is Allura, and I'm the student dean. I'll be settling you all into your new life here. Katie—"

"My name is Pidge."

Allura glanced at her checkboard, making a note. "Alright, then, Pidge, you'll be settled in the girls' dormitory. You were the last addition to make a full room. Keith, Lance, Hunk, you three will be sharing a room together—if we get any new male students, they'll be added to your room, but for now, it will be only the three of you."

Keith spoke up. "So—you're the student dean? Are you who we'd talk to about getting a separate room?" Lance _would _have been offended by the question, but he'd been planning to ask it himself, so he supposed he couldn't blame Keith.

Allura smiled brightly. "Yes, I am, and the answer is no. We don't have enough space in the dorms to accommodate every request for a single room, so we must reject them all. Follow me, please."

Keith nodded like that was what he expected and shifted the duffle bag on his shoulder, following Allura. Lance gave him a glare, deciding that he could _absolutely _be offended by the question Keith had asked. Hunk followed close behind with Pidge trailing, loaded down by her bags.

They made the first stop at Pidge's room, and Allura introduced Pidge to her new roommates.

"This is Nyma," she announced, and Lance nearly lost his jaw again. Yet another angel. If this was _punishment_, then he couldn't wait to see what rewards were! "That's Florona—" also gorgeous— "and that's Plaxum." Wow. This school had really hit it on the girls. "I trust you'll get along. Girls, this is Katie, but she prefers—Pidge, right?"

Lance could tell that Allura had a memory like a steel trap but was pretending to struggle with Pidge's name to seem more human and approachable.

Pidge nodded.

"Right. You girls show her the ropes, please, and make her feel welcome." Allura nodded to Hunk, Keith and Lance. "You boys come with me."

Lance trotted after her to a separated dorm, and they were shown to a room that was mostly empty, with two bunk beds, two closets and two dressers.

"This will be your new home. Please be fair dividing up the space, and know that you might have a new student moving in with you at any time. I'll be sending up the class president in a bit to show you around."

Allura disappeared, and Keith immediately claimed one of the bottom bunks, throwing his duffle bag onto the bed and glaring at Hunk and Lance as if _daring _them to contradict his decision.

Lance turned to Hunk. "I take top, you take bottom?"

Hunk nodded. "Sounds good."

Lance climbed the ladder and stretched out on the bed. "Did you see those girls? Wow, huh?"

Keith snorted. "I think you're forgetting that everyone here is a bit of a _criminal_? Those girls might be pretty, but you have _no idea _what they've done. They could be psychotic murderers for all you know."

Lance made a face at him. "Ugh, who asked you, Mr. Doom-and-Gloom? I was _talking _to Hunk."

Keith settled onto his bed, the shadows hiding his face. "I'm just saying, don't forget where you are. Anyone could be incredibly dangerous."

"If anyone's a psychotic killer here, I think I know who my money is on," Lance muttered.

Keith didn't respond, and Lance started to unpack his suitcase, hanging up some clothes and folding others and putting them in the drawer. There was a knock on the door and a tall, dark-skinned boy with long black hair poked his head in.

"Hello? Allura sent me to show you around." He opened the door completely and held out a hand. "I'm Lotor, the class president."

Hunk and Lance obligingly shook the hand and introduced themselves. Keith didn't move from his bed.

"Mr. Intimidating over there is Keith," Lance told Lotor.

"Ah. Hello, Keith."

Keith stayed silent.

Lotor wrinkled his nose. "Ooookay, well, I'm here to show you our glorious campus, so unless you want to be lost on your first day, I suggest you follow me." He turned and walked out the door with the air of someone who knew others would follow him.

Hunk and Lance walked out after him, and after a few moments, Keith slid off of his bed fluidly and followed them like a shadow. Out of the corner of his eye, Lance could see him noting the other students they passed in the hallways. Probably marking his next murder victim. Lotor was pointing out various aspects of the campus.

"Down that hallway are all of the classrooms. There's a four-minute passing period between periods, so if you've got classes at either end of the hallway, you'll have to book it. Over there is the cafeteria, and here..." Lotor pushed open a door. "is the library." He smiled at them. "Any questions?"

"How long have you been here?" Hunk asked.

"Longer than most. A year-and-a-half, I believe."

"That's not very long."

"Yeah," Keith said, finally breaking his brooding silence, "Why are most of the students here our age or younger? There should be a senior class, right? And people should be here longer than a year-and-a-half."

Lotor glanced around, and leaned in towards them, his face cautious, nervous. "Don't go talking about this openly," he whispered, "but... well... students have been disappearing."

Lance and Hunk recoiled in shock. Even Keith looked startled. Then Lotor laughed.

"Why so serious? I'm pulling your leg. They graduate. Once you're deemed safe enough for society, they let you go back home. Most people are rehabilitated in under a year, so we don't have much of a senior class. They try to catch people of interest young, before they're out of school and therefore out of reach. You're going to—hm, well, you might not _love _it here, but I sincerely doubt that you'll hate it any more than you hate your normal school." Lotor mimed dusting off his hands. "Well, my presidential duties have been fulfilled. Don't break the rules, don't bother the principal, and above all else, _don't go into the L wing_." He started to walk away.

Lance blinked. "Wait, what? What's wrong with the principal? What's in the L wing?"

Lotor just walked away.

"He was messing with us again, right?" Hunk whispered, "Right? There's nothing wrong with the L wing, right?"

Lance shivered. The hallway suddenly seemed a lot more menacing. "Yeah. He was totally messing with us."

Keith shrugged and wandered off a different way.

Lance frowned. "Hey! Where are _you _going?"

"Remember what I'm in for?"

"Yeah, yeah, history of violence against nosy people, I _get _it, you could just say 'none of your business', you know!"

"You and budding-chef over there go back to the dorms. Or wherever you want to crawl to, as long as it isn't following me."

"He has a name!" Lance called, practically growling at Keith, "It's Hunk!"

"Thanks. I'll forget that in the next five seconds."

"Why are you such a _jerk_?!"

Keith stopped and turned to face Lance. "I'm riding this out until I'm eighteen, and then fft, I'm out of here." He grazed one hand with the other for emphasis. "If I'm going to be sticking around for the next ten months, I want to know everything about this place. It's how you _survive_."

"You make it sound as though everyone is actively trying to kill you!"

"That's because in all likelihood, they probably are. Think about it, right around now, you probably would like to push me out of a window, right?"

"I can't deny that the thought is crossing my mind," Lance grumbled.

"Right. I'm looking out for number one, surviving as long as I need to. I'm _not _going back to foster care, I'm going to stay here until I'm a legal adult and then leave. Now, keep your nose out of my business or I'll break it for you."

And then he was gone.

"_Stars_," Lance grumbled, "We're going to be roommates for ten months, he could at least _try _to be a_little _friendly." He grinned at Hunk. "Want to put our noses in his business?"

"And get them broken? No, _thank you_. _You _go ahead. If you want _him _to be _friendly_, maybe _you _should respect his privacy."

Lance's nose wrinkled. "On the contrary, _he _isn't going to be nice no matter _what _we do, so I might as well annoy the heck out of him and at least get some fun out of it. Come on, what's the worst that could happen?" he started down the hallway after Keith.

"Our noses could get broken," Hunk grumbled, but he followed behind Lance.

They found him in front of a pair of doors.

_L-wing. Restricted area. Stay out_.

Lance put his hands on his hips. "You _immediately _went to the _one place _Lotor told us to stay away from?"

"I thought I told you not to follow me," Keith said without turning around. He reached for the door handle. It rattled. Locked. And then an alarm went off, the doors behind them shutting down.

"Holy crow!" Lance yelped, "You're going to get us all in trouble!"

"No," Keith said lightly, "_You _are going to get in trouble because _you_ poked your pointy little nose where it didn't belong!"

"How can you be so calm?! I thought you wanted to stay here! We're _all _going to get in trouble here, you know!"

"No._You _might be, but _I'm _not."

Keith jammed a metal object—was that a _knife_?!—into the crack between a window and the sill. He levered the window open and rolled out of it.

"Bye!"

Lance ran for the window, but it slammed shut without Keith holding it open. "Oh, stars! Stars, stars, stars! We're going to get in _so _much trouble!"

"Keith breaking our noses would be the _best_-case scenario!" Hunk yelped, "We might have bothered the principal! One of the things Lotor told us not to do! And why will we have bothered him? For doing the _other _thing that Lotor told us not to do!"

The alarms shut off, and, to Lance's horror, it was _Allura _who was glaring at them. Even worse.

"Breaking the rules early, are we?"


	2. Chapter 2

Lance and Hunk sat meekly in Allura’s office as she paced in front of them.

“Did Lotor show you what you needed to know?!”

“Yes ma’am,” they murmured.

“Did he show you the L wing and say, go ahead, free for all?!”

“No, ma’am.”

“Did he _specifically tell you not to go into the L wing_?!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Are you two deaf, insane, or idiotic?!”

“No, ma’am.”

“Then _why_, might I ask, did you go _straight to the L wing_?!”

“We… were curious?” Hunk offered tentatively.

Much as Lance decidedly hated Keith, ratting him out was _not_a cool thing to do. Also, it would make the roommate dynamic decidedly more hostile, and Lance rather liked his nose the way it was. So when Allura turned her fiery gaze on him, he merely nodded in sheepish agreement.

Allura inhaled deeply, her nostrils flaring. “Did it maybe, just possibly, occur to you that the rules are in place for a _reason_?!”

“We’re sorry?” Hunk tried.

“What’s wrong with the L wing?” Lance said at the same time.

Allura sighed. “The L wing used to be the science labs. Back when I was a freshman student here—I’d say about eight years ago—There was an explosion. A bad fire. The L wing has been off-limits ever since. It’s unstable in there. You could get hurt. Do you two understand this?”

They nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Okay. I’ll let it slide this time. But if I catch you breaking the rules again, I will _immediately_turn you over to Sendak, our head of discipline. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Now stay out of trouble.”

They nodded frantically and were out of her office immediately. Once outside with a closed door safely between them and Allura, Lance let out a slow whistle.

“Whoever Sendak is, I sincerely doubt that he could do a better job disciplining a student than Allura.”

“How come you didn’t rat Keith out?”

Lance slumped down the hallway, hands in his pockets. “Ah, well, you know. That’s a sneak thing to do.”

The corner of Hunk’s mouth twitched up. “And…?”

“And snitches get stitches,” Lance snapped, “Do I have to spell it out? I don’t want to wake up one night to find him standing over me with a knife!”

“Oh, come on, he wouldn’t.”

“If you think Keith wouldn’t put either of us in a hospital, you’re kidding yourself. He most definitely, absolutely would.”

They opened the door to their dorm room, and there was Keith, on his bed, reading a book.

“Thanks a lot,” Lance grumbled, “You left _us_to take the fall.”

“You wouldn’t have been falling if you had listened to me in the first place. You seem to be failing to remember that…” Keith looked up from his book. “Sorry, what was your name again?”

Lance’s mouth fell open. “It’s Lance! I’m Lance, and this is Hunk! _Geeze_. We’re going to be living together for ten months, you’d better learn our names!”

“Yeah, sure.” Keith went back to his book.

“We didn’t rat you out,” Lance grumbled, “You’re _welcome_.”

Keith closed his book with a _snap_. “Let’s get this straight, dingbat, I don’t _owe_you, you can’t _blame me_, because I didn’t _plan_on you being there. I would have been _just fine_, and _you_would have been just fine if you hadn’t been a bone-head and followed me! Your own nosiness got you caught, not me! Not ratting me out was the _least_you could do after being dumb enough to stick your nose in my business and getting yourselves caught and in a position to tell on me! Without you, there would have been _no danger_of me getting caught, but by following me, you put _me_in danger as well as yourselves! As far as _I’m_concerned, _I’m_the only one who has any right to be angry!” He opened his book again and went back to reading.

Lance glared at him and went to his bunk, climbing up it noisily and making as much noise as was possible while arranging pillows. Keith just plugged his headphones in and tuned him out. Hunk sighed.

“I think I’m getting a headache.”

The next day, they met up with Pidge in the cafeteria. She grinned. “Heard you got busted trying to go into the forbidden wing.”

“Yeah? And how would you know that, huh?”

“Nyma. She’s my roommate. She heard it from her friend Rollo, and he knows because he saw Allura marching you down the hall by your ears. ‘Parently, the security is super tight around that wing. ‘for the safety of the students,’ supposedly.”

“You appear to be having better luck with your roommates than we are with ours.”

“You got edgy McEmo, right?”

“Un_fortunately_. Tell me, what did I do to deserve him?”

“You took the principal’s car out for a joyride,” Pidge said flatly.

“Yeah, and you committed internet fraud, but you got paired up with three girls who you like and who _tell you things_. We just get told that we’ll get our noses broken if we mess with him!”

“Seems like a fair deal to me.”

“Your roommates showed you around the school, right?” Hunk asked, sitting next to them.

“Yeah. Told me not to go into the L wing. Did your tour guide not tell you that?”

“He did,” Lance grumbled, “But Keith ignored him.”

“Seems you did too.”

Lance pointedly ignored this statement. “What have _you_been doing then?”

“Attempting to hack the school mainframe,” Pidge said casually.

Lance nearly spit out his milk. “What? Why?”

“I want to know more about my roommates,” she said matter-of-factly, “And while I’m at it, more about the entire school.”

Hunk gave her a nod. “I note that you’re not wearing the girls’ uniform. I didn’t know they made boys’ uniforms that small.”

Pidge lifted her chin. “The purpose of a uniform is to unify the students by dressing them in similar attire. I don’t see how dividing the girls and the boys into separate uniforms will achieve this goal, as it will split our uniformity in two, pitting female against male. I told Allura as much, and she has given permission for me to wear the boy’s uniform, as I sincerely doubt that any boy here will ever wear the skirt, therefore meaning that the girls must make the switch over to the decidedly-more-comfortable boys uniform.”

Hunk laughed. “If I ever need a lawyer, I’m going to hire you.”

She grinned. “Thanks.”

“Any luck hacking the mainframe, then?”

“None. They’ve got it locked down as tightly as the computer-world equivalence of Fort Knox. Nothing doing.”

Lance shrugged. “Oh, well. It was worth a try.”

“Worth a try? I’m still doing it. I haven’t stopped, I’m just currently a bit stuck. I’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Anything you want me to find out?”

“Keith’s crime,” Hunk said, “I want to know who I’m rooming with.”

“You and me both,” Pidge said cheerfully.

“I thought your roommates were nice?”

“They are,” Pidge assured him, “but I still want to know what they’re in for.” She grinned, swinging her backpack onto her shoulder and walking away. “See you later.”

Lance looked at the clock and sighed. Class time. “What do you have first?”

“English. You?”

“Physics.” Lance and Hunk split ways, and Lance wandered into the Physics room, Keith behind him. Of _course_he had first period class with Mr. Survivalist. Why wouldn’t he?”

Their teacher was already in the classroom, a man with a shock of white bangs and a prosthetic arm. He smiled at them. “Seating chart is on the board.”

Lance glanced at it and groaned internally. They were arranged alphabetically by first name. He was paired with Keith. He approached the teacher quietly.

“Um, Mr…?”

“Shirogane. Most call me Shiro.”

“Right. Mr. Shiro, uh… any chance I could get a different partner?”

Shiro’s eyebrow rose. “Don’t get along with your partner?”

“Not so far, no.”

“Good chance to learn to work with him, then. I’m not changing the seating chart.”

Lance barely contained a sigh of disappointment and slumped back to his seat. Keith was giving him a more-hostile-than-usual glare, and Lance wondered how good his hearing was. Shouldn’t matter. Keith had wanted to transfer rooms, so as far as Lance was concerned, they were even.

Physics passed in a blur of equations and practical problems, and the rest of Lance’s school day was the same. Up until lunchtime. In the passing period, someone grabbed the back of Keith’s backpack and yanked. “Hey, you.”

“Here comes trouble,” Pidge muttered.

Keith slid out of the backpack straps and whirled around. “Go away,” he said bluntly, “And give me my backpack.”

The other student smirked, and threw the backpack at him. He was about twice Keith’s size, but Keith caught the backpack and glared at him like they were on even footing.

“You’re just a little freak. What are you going to do?”

They were up close and personal now, Keith tilting his head up to glare in the other student’s face. “Back off.”

“Make me.”

Lance pushed his way between them. “Hey, hey, simmer down, guys, no fighting necessary! We’re humans, not wolves, we don’t have to fight for alpha position.” He wasn’t sure who he was interjecting for. Maybe he just didn’t want there to be a fight, because he certainly didn’t like either of these people.

The other student gave Lance a hearty push, shoving him into Keith and knocking them both over. “Stay out of it. Freak-show and I are just having a little talk.”

Keith pushed Lance away and was up in an instant, moving so fast it looked like he’d teleported, slamming his open palm into the other student’s nose. In moments, they were tussling on the floor, Lance still sprawled on the floor in shock a few feet away.

“Up you get,” a voice told him quietly, and a hand hauled him up. It was Shiro, moving quickly to break up the fight. Another hulk of a man was behind him, and they pried the fighting boys apart. The student crowd dispersed, leaving only Lance, Hunk, the teachers and the ones who had been fighting.

“You,” the big man snapped at Keith, “You,” he snapped to the other boy, “You.” The condemning finger pointed at Lance. “And—well, probably not you, but come along anyway.” This was to Hunk, who looked distinctly uncomfortable, but obeyed.

They were marched to an office, which read, simply, “Sendak.” Lance gulped. The big man was the head of discipline. Of course. Yep. Made sense. Allura was waiting inside.

“Why am I not surprised to see you two?” she sighed at Hunk and Lance.

“It’s not their fault,” Shiro said tiredly, “They were just there.”

“What happened?” Sendak questioned in a deep, tell-me-or-I’ll-break-your-kneecaps voice.

Keith didn’t answer. He was too busy glaring out the window.

“_He_threw the first punch!” the other student gibbered. He’d come out of the fight _way_worse than Keith, with two black eyes and a bloody nose.

“Yeah, sure, after you pushed Lance into him,” Hunk snapped, and then looked surprised at himself.

Shiro put a hand on the other student’s arm. “Why don’t you wait outside? I’ll send them out in a couple of minutes, and then you can tell us _your_side of the story.”

The other student left, and Sendak glared at them all. “Anyone going to explain?”

Keith was still glaring out the window, his fingers tapping the chair with angry energy.

“He was harassing Keith,” Lance piped up, “They looked like they were going to fight, so I got in-between them, and then he pushed me into Keith.”

“Then Keith attacked him,” Hunk added.

Sendak looked at Keith. “Kogane? Anything to add?”

Keith didn’t break eye contact with the window. “No, sir.”

“McClain? Garret?”

“Yes, sir?”

“You’re roommates with him. Tell me, has he displayed any rule-breaking behavior? Done anything he shouldn’t?”

Keith froze, his eyes darting back towards Lance and Hunk. Lance hesitated. He’d been directly questioned. If he ratted Keith out, there wasn’t any blame. Anyone would tell the truth, in his situation. He didn’t have a choice.

“No, sir,” he said in a small voice.

Hunk gave him a surprised look, and Keith stopped tensing so much, still looking at them like a deer in the headlights.

“Fine. Send the other one in.”

They got out of the office as fast as they could, the other student giving them a nasty glare as he went in, mouthing “you’re dead” at Keith.

Keith gave Lance a curious glance. “You didn’t snitch.”

Lance shrugged, uncomfortable.

“You could have gotten me out of the room, had it all to you and... what’s your name again?”

“Hunk.”

“Right. But you didn’t.”

Lance shoved his hands in his pockets. “Yeah. So?”

“So why not?”

Lance shrugged again. “I don’t know. Just didn’t seem like a cool thing to do.”

“Thanks.” Keith winced, like saying it had physically hurt him.

Shiro poked his head out. “Keith, you come back in. You two, you’re free to go.”

Hunk and Lance couldn’t get out of there fast enough.


	3. Chapter 3

Lance stretched out on his bed. “Hey, Hunk.”

“Yeah?”

“You think Keith’s going to be any friendlier?”

“For us _not _snitching on him? I don’t know. Probably not. He said thanks, he’ll probably go back to being an ice block.”

“Yeah, probably.”

The door opened, and Keith walked through, going right to his bed and throwing his backpack down on it. He sat on the bed, opening a schoolbook. Lance edged closer.

“Uh… Keith? What happened?”

Keith didn’t glance up from the book. “Nose. Out. Break it.”

Hunk gave him an “I told you so” look, and Lance got up to his bed, reaching for the lightswitch. “It’s bedtime.”

“Don’t turn off that light,” Keith said evenly.

“Look, it’s not _my _fault that you’re behind in class. _I _didn’t push you into a fight. _I’m _not going to be up late because _you _have make-up work.”

“You touch that lightswitch, I dump you out the window while you’re asleep,” Keith said in a matter-of-fact tone, “Leave the lightswitch alone.”

Lance left the lightswitch alone.

He pulled his blanket over his head, trying to block out the light and fall asleep.

He woke up again with the light off. Keith must have finished his homework.

The door creaked, and Lance sat up straight in his bed, staring at the door and waiting for something to come in. He wasn’t expecting something to be going out. Keith looked both ways and then slid out into the hallway.

Lance climbed out of bed and slipped after him, ducking behind trash cans or pressing against the wall every time Keith looked back. He was probably going to the L wing. He was going to get caught, this time.

But, to his surprise, Keith went to the library. Lance followed, frowning. What would he want in the library? Keith seemed to know _exactly _where he was going, moving through the shelves confidently and stopping. He reached for a book that was just out of reach, straining on his tiptoes.

“Do you need a stepladder?”

Keith had him in a chokehold in an instant, his arm pressing on Lance’s windpipe. “Why are you following me?!”

Lance suddenly wondered whether Keith really _was_in because he’d attacked someone who was being a little nosy. “Gah—just—wondered—slipped out!”

Keith let him go, turning back to his bookshelf. “You should go back to the room.”

Lance rubbed his throat. “Why are you out here in the middle of the night?”

Keith ignored him, climbing up on the bottom shelf and reaching again for the book, a really thick novel. He grabbed in and pulled. There was a click, and the shelf pushed out from the wall and to the side, revealing a secret passage. Keith hopped off. “I _thought _that seemed off.”

“What?”

“The novel. It’s shelved in the wrong place.”

Lance stared at Keith in deep disbelief. “You snuck out of your room at night… against curfew… shortly after you got into a fight… because you saw a library book shelved in the wrong spot?! How did you know it wasn’t an accident?!”

Keith peered into the tunnel. “Because no matter how bad of a librarian you are, you don’t shelve a _fiction _book in the _nonfiction _section.” He started walking down the passage.

“What?! You make no sense! Why would it be _hiding something_?! It’s just a book!”

“It was too convenient.”

“Convenient?!”

“Go away. You’re loud.”

“What do you _mean_, convenient?!”

Keith stopped dead in his tracks. “That novel was _David Copperfield_. No one sees it on the shelf and thinks ‘oh, there’s an interesting book, I’d like to check it out!’ If someone _wants _to read _David Copperfield_, God only knows why, they go to the place it _should _be shelved. So, essentially, the likelihood of anyone seeing the book over here and taking it off the shelf is _way _unlikely. Now go back to bed.”

“No _way_! There’s a secret passageway in the school, and you want me to just _not _come down it?!”

Keith pinned him by the shoulders to the wall. “Listen, you can’t tell _anyone _about this. Not the computer girl, not your big friend—”

“His name is _Hunk_,” Lance growled, “Why won’t you remember his name?”

“It’s nothing personal, I don’t remember yours either.” He continued before Lance could even make an indignant noise. “You keep this secret, got it?! Don’t tell _anyone_.”

“But—”

“_No one_. Swear it, or I’ll throw you out of a window.”

“Geeze, okay, okay, I promise, I won’t tell anyone. Why are you so protective?”

Keith let him go and prowled cautiously down the hallway. “Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead,” he said grimly, “I don’t want everyone knowing about this. It’ll get us in trouble.”

Lance followed him. “Where do you think this goes?”

“If I had to guess? The L wing.”

“_Creepy_.”

A girl’s scream echoed down the hallway, and they glanced at each other. “You first,” Lance said nervously.

Keith crept forward, and then they heard voices from behind them.

“—open.”

“Don’t know. Do you think one of the students found it on accident?”

The voices were echoing too much for Lance to tell who they were. He and Keith bolted to the end of the tunnel, emerging in an unused lab. Keith ran for a window and levered it open, climbing out onto a narrow ledge.

“Oh, no,” Lance muttered, “No, no, no. Not going out there.”

“You get out here or I throw you out. I’m not getting caught by someone who makes people scream.”

Lance climbed out, trying his hardest not to look down. “_You’re _going to make _me _scream! We’re going to die.”

“_Sh_!”

The people were coming out of the tunnel now.

“No one would have found it on accident. No browser is going to pick up _David Copperfield_. Someone must have left it open. What was the blood analysis, again?”

“Type AB. Good. We’re finishing the procedure as best we can, then we’ll pull her.”

“It’s drafty in here.”

Someone walked over and closed the window. Lance nearly screamed, but one look from Keith told him that if he made a noise, Keith would push him off the ledge and make a run for it, no questions asked, no hesitation. Lance bit his lip so hard he tasted blood, but he didn’t make a squeak.

The voices faded down the hallway, and Keith gave a sigh of relief. Then he jumped off of the ledge. Lance yelped, sure he’d just witnessed Keith’s last moments alive, but then he saw him crouched on a narrow section of roof.

“Alright, nosy, stay where you’re at,” Keith called, and shimmied down a drainpipe.

Lance waited, his legs starting to turn into jelly, the cold night air making him shiver. He started to suspect that Keith was going to leave him out here as a punishment for being nosy, but then the window opened.

“Okay.”

“I can’t move,” Lance whispered.

“Yes, you can, and you will if you don’t want to stay out there for the rest of your subsequently short life. They’ll come back eventually, and I’m not sticking around when they do.”

“I _can’t_.”

Something grabbed his ankle and jerked him towards the window. Lance lost balance and fell, yelping and squeezing his eyes shut. Something grabbed his arm, and he was pulled, slowly but surely, towards the window. It felt like his arm was going to get ripped off, but then Keith was grabbing him by both arms and hauling him through the window. Lance fell rather ungracefully to the floor and Keith started back towards the passage.

“I’m going back to bed.”

“What about the girl?”

“I’m not getting caught. You feel free to be chivalrous and save no one if you want, but don’t mention me when you’re under torture, okay?”

Lance scrambled after him. “Torture?” His voice squeaked on the second syllable.

“Undoubtedly.” Keith strode briskly through the hallways until they got back to their room. “And Lance? Remember, not a word.”

Lance blinked. “Hey, you _do _know my name!”

Keith didn’t respond.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had an unfortunate assignment where I had to read David Copperfield.


	4. Chapter 4

Lance had expected that maybe things would be friendlier after what he and Keith had discovered. He was dead wrong. Keith was just as standoffish as before, and Lance couldn’t even complain to Hunk about it, because that would probably end with both of them getting pushed out of a window. Weeks passed, and they never talked about it again. Whenever Lance heard Keith leaving in the night, he rolled over and went back to sleep.

One morning, Pidge came up to them the minute they entered the dining hall. “Guys, Florona’s gone! I can’t find her anywhere! Her stuff is gone, and no one’s seen her since last night! I haven’t seen her, Plaxum hasn’t seen her, Nyma hasn’t seen her—none of the other girls have seen her, either!”

Lance glanced at Keith. Had Florona been the girl screaming in the L wing? Had Keith gone back? Had he seen her?

“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation,” Hunk soothed, “Come on, we’ll ask Allura. She’ll know.”

“I asked already! She said that Florona graduated!”

“Well, there you go, then,” Hunk said amiably, “She graduated and got out. She went home.”

But Pidge was shaking her head. “Florona wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye!”

“It was the middle of the night,” Hunk reassured her, “I’m sure she just didn’t want to wake you.”

“No! You don’t get it! It’s not like Florona at all! She would have been excited, and she would have woken us up to say goodbye! She and Plaxum were best friends! She wouldn’t have just left sneakily in the night!”

Hunk shrugged helplessly. “Lance, help me out here!”

Lance slowly shook his head. “What if… you ever think that anything sinister might be going on? Like… maybe there’s stuff they’re not telling us?”

“No,” Hunk said blankly, “It’s school.”

Pidge shivered, looking a bit uneasy. “I don’t know. The school’s computer systems are unusually secure. I can’t even access student records. It’s weird. I’ve made a bit of a break, but the best I can do is screw with the alarm systems.”

An idea hit Lance. “Pidge, do you think you could set off the fire alarm today?”

“Yeah, sure, no problem. Why?”

Lance glanced around, looking for Keith. He was across the cafeteria, and Lance leaned in towards his friends. “There’s something I want to show you two, and I think maybe some people would be a little… ticked off if they found out.”

“Okay,” Pidge whispered back, “Second period study hall?”

“Yeah. Okay. Good. Just slip away from your group and we’ll meet at the library.”

Lance was jumpy all through Physics, and Keith gave him suspicious glances, but didn’t say anything. The bell rang for the end of first period and then, during the passing period, the fire alarm went off. Pandemonium ensued, teachers trying to corral students who were no longer in their period. Lance could hear Mr. Shiro’s voice above the chaos, telling his second-period kids to follow him.

Lance pushed through the frightened kids to the library. Pidge and Hunk were waiting for him, and they slipped inside. Lance led them through the library to the bookshelf, looking for the _David Copperfield _book.

“Hold on, I’ll find it—oh!” Lance spotted the book and grabbed it. It came off of the shelf. Nothing happened.

Pidge peered at the book. “You had me set off the fire alarm… so that you could show me a book?!”

“No, I—it shouldn’t have come off the shelf, there should have been—this isn’t right!”

“The passageway is gone,” Keith’s voice said behind them, “They must have gotten rid of it the moment they figured they’d had intruders. Windows are boarded up, too. No way back in. I’ve been looking around every night.” Lance whirled around. Keith was glaring at him, arms crossed. “You weren’t supposed to tell anyone.”

“Hey, look, I—”

“I’ve been trying to figure out which of the teachers we can trust. I’ve been investigating carefully, sounding out who is part of this, and who isn’t. And here you are, running around, just… telling people willy-nilly!”

“Pidge’s roommate is missing!”

“Yeah? Maybe Pidge is _part _of it, did you consider _that_?!” Keith paused. “Maybe _you’re _a part of it.”

“Look, I think people have a right to know!”

“Yeah, sure, when we can tell people _safely_!”

Lance faced Keith down. “You don’t get the monopoly on who we can tell! You don’t even care about us! Why should _you_get to decide what’s best?! You’re just a paranoid—”

“Shut up!”

“Over-confident—”

“I mean it, Lance, you shut up!”

“Selfish—”

Keith’s fists clenched. “One more word, Lance, I swear—”

“Brat!”

Keith popped him in the nose. Lance saw bright stars, and then a dull ache spread through his face. He touched his nose in a daze and brought it back with blood. “Ugh—ah! AH! You broke my node! You _broke _id!” Lance hollered, his words stuffed.

Hunk snatched the _David Copperfield _book from Lance’s hand and shoved it back on the shelf as footsteps approached. Keith slipped away as Sendak appeared around the corner.

“What’s going on?!” he bellowed, “Why aren’t you with your classmates?!”

“We… got lost?” Hunk offered.

“And what happened to you?!”

“Keith broke my node!” Lance screeched, holding his nose, “He _broke _id!”

“He _did_,” Pidge yelped, “He broke Lance’s nose!”

Shiro slipped in behind them. “What? What’s happening?”

“Your charge,” Sendak growled, “The one you took responsibility for? The one you said you’d big brother after the last incident? He’s done it again.”

Shiro flinched guiltily. “Just give me more time, I—”

“He has a history of this, you know that! That’s why he’s here, a violent history of getting into fights with people who disagree with him! You’re supposed to be watching him, making sure things like this don’t happen!”

“The fire—I wasn’t watching—”

“You’re supposed to be conditioning him! Making sure that he doesn’t _want_to do things like this!”

“Look, Rome wasn’t built in a day. Just give me more _time_, Sendak, I can help him.”

“You’d better.” Sendak seemed to remember that Lance, Hunk and Pidge were there. “You go to the nurse.”

“Whud aboud Keith?” Lance muttered, “You gonna punish hib?”

Shiro gave a dry chuckle. “Can’t punish him if we can’t find him.”

Sendak shot Shiro an annoyed look. “Do you find his evasion of justice _funny_, Shirogane?”

Shiro wiped the smile off of his face. “No, no, of course not. Lance, don’t worry, we’ll find him. And… I’ll switch you from being lab partners with him, okay?”

“Oday,” Lance muttered.

“You go to the nurse now.”

“Righd.”

Xxx

Keith hauled himself into the window of Shiro’s office and waited. Shiro opened the door, and jumped, putting a hand on his chest. “Keith, don’t _scare me _like that.” Then he frowned. “You’re in trouble. _Big _trouble. You broke another student’s nose?!”

Keith crossed his arms defensively. “He deserved it,” he muttered, “I warned him.”

“Keith, you can’t just _do _that!”

“Yeah, I messed up, okay? I know. Are you going to turn me in?”

Shiro sighed. “You have a good reason for being in here?”

“Shiro, I…” Keith hesitated. “Shiro, can I trust you?”

“Of course you can, Keith.”

Yeah, well, sure he’d _say _that. But he never _could _trust them, they never _listened_. “I…” Keith clammed up. No. He’d laugh.

“Keith,” Shiro said gently, “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”

“There’s a secret tunnel in the school that goes to the L wing,” Keith burst out, “And I don’t know what they’re doing in there, but we heard a girl scream, and—”

“We?”

“Lance and I, he followed me, it’s not important, but Shiro, I think they’re doing something with students!”

Shiro sighed, and Keith braced himself for it. The ‘oh, that’s just the paranoia,’ or ‘oh, Keith, your imagination is running wild, nothing is happening or going to happen.’ They _always _acted like that, like he was _nuts_, or over-imaginative or paranoid or making up stories for attention, and they never believed him until there were bruises.

“I’ll look into it.”

Keith’s heart started beating at a faster tempo in his chest. Shiro… wasn’t dismissing him?

“You will?”

Shiro gave a tired smile. “I always thought it was a bit odd that my former students never called.” His gaze leveled with Keith’s. “Look, I’m not expecting a huge conspiracy. Whatever you’re thinking… however bad you think it is… stars, I hope it’s not that bad. But I’ll look into it.”

“Thank you, Shiro.”

“Keith?”

“Yeah?”

“Turn yourself in.”

“Shiro—”

“It’ll be easier. The longer you hide from Sendak, the angrier he’ll be when he catches you—because he _will _catch you, eventually. You broke a kid’s nose. It’s not something that you can pretend isn’t a direct violation of rules.”

Keith toed the ground. He knew Shiro was right. “Yeah. Okay.”

“I’ve switched you to a new lab partner. I don’t think Lance will want to… you know.”

“He’s already my roommate. How much more awkward could it get?” Keith gave Shiro a tired smile. “Thank you, Shiro.”


	5. Chapter 5

Lance was surprised to find Keith already back in their room when he and Hunk got there. “You!”

“Me,” Keith agreed grimly as he continued to read a book, “More precisely, me with three weeks of detention. Thanks a lot.”

“You broke my node!” Lance said angrily, still stuffed up, “The lead you could do id _look _ad me!” Keith didn’t respond, and Lance threw himself on his bed, fuming. “You are the word roobade eber,” he growled. Keith, predictably, said nothing. Lance took a quick look at the cover of the book he was reading. “Oh, thad’s id!” The book was _David Copperfield_.

Lance stormed out the door. Hunk followed him. “Where are you going?”

“Allura! Id’s aboud dime we god a roobade change.”

“Yeah… he got you pretty good, huh?”

“I _hade _hib!” Lance burst out, “He’s trouble!”

“Hey, I think you got two words out without any stuffiness!” Hunk encouraged.

“He’s always gedding be in trouble!”

“Hey, wait,” Hunk said gently, “I’m not taking his side—he popped you in the face, and he’s been kind of awful, but you got in trouble because you followed him.”

Lance ignored this fact.

Pidge rounded the corner, nearly running into them. “Hey! Guys! I have something to show you!”

“We’re getting rid of Keith,” Hunk told her, “Maybe some other time.”

“Please?”

“Fine,” Lance sighed, “I’b suffering anyway. I can waid a liddle longer.”

Pidge brightened, and led them to the library, where she had a computer and all of the yearbooks. “Okay, so I’ve been looking through the yearbooks, noting who was here, and who disappeared between when photos were taken one year and then the next year—which amounts to nearly everyone, actually. No one ever actually makes it through senior year, here. Weird, huh?”

Hunk shrugged. “Lotor said that they graduate when they’re fit members of society. Maybe just no one ever took that long to reform.”

“Right, okay, but I was looking up all of the old school members, trying to find them, and some of them haven’t been heard from since! Besides the fact that all of the ones still around have depressingly boring and normal lives, I can’t find what they have in common…”

“Try blood dype,” Lance offered, remembering the shadowy figure talking about someone being type AB.

Pidge eyed the computer. “I’d have to get onto school records… I suppose it’s worth a shot. I haven’t seen anything to connect them so far, so I guess it can’t hurt.”

“Kay. Gread. Be an’ Hunk are gonna ged rid of Keith. Be back lader.”

“Good luck.”

They ran into Allura in the hallway. “Allura, I wad wondering—”

She started speaking at the same time, her big blue eyes worried. “Lance, Hunk, have you seen Lotor?”

Hunk frowned. “No. Should we have?”

“I don’t know, but I can’t find him _anywhere_. There’s a student council meeting going on, and if he’s gotten hurt somewhere, his father will have my _head_, which, frankly, is something I’d quite like to keep.”

“Hid fader?” Lance questioned with a frown.

“Oh, yes, his father is the principal. I have to get going. I’ll see you soon. Sorry about whatever you wanted to ask me, Lance, it’ll have to wait. Missing students take priority I’m afraid.”

“Gread,” Lance muttered as she strode down the hallway, “We’re stuck with hib.”

Xxx

Pidge frowned, her fingers dancing across the keyboard in a mesmerizing click of keys. The firewall surrounding school security was difficult, but not impossible to break. She just had to… the firewall gave way, granting her access to the whole school systems. She didn’t _think_anyone had figured out she’d been the one to set off the fire alarm, but she wanted to get in and out of here, quickly before they realized she was there.

She pulled up her spreadsheet, highlighting the missing students and then returning to the school systems. Each of the students had their own profile, and going on Lance’s idea, Pidge looked at their blood types. Every single one of the missing students was AB positive. And _none _of the students out in the world were AB positive.

Pidge frowned. What was the deal with AB positive students? She continued flicking through profiles, the more recent ones, now. She was A positive. Hunk was O negative. Lance was B negative. Florona was AB positive. So were Nyma and Plaxum. Lotor. Keith.

“Weird,” she muttered. Suddenly, her computer started flashing a virus warning at her and then started her automatic cleansing system, fighting back against the virus. It started deleting corrupted files, and Pidge gasped.

“Hey, wait!” She typed furiously away, but her own system defeated her: the school files and her spreadsheets were gone. Pidge frowned. That _couldn’t _be a coincidence.

Xxx

“Where do _you _think Lotor is?”

Lance shrugged. “Heck ib _I _know. Brobably hiding from council meedings.”

Hunk leaned out from his bunk bed. “Hey, Keith, by they way, Lotor’s missing.”

Keith steadily ignored him.

“One of our classmades id _missing_!” Lance said irritably, “You could ad least show a _liddle _concern!”

Keith still didn’t say anything, and Lance frowned, coming down and shoving his shoulder.

He fell apart.

“Oh my stars, you killed Keith!” Hunk yelped.

“I didn’d kill him! Id’s nod him! He sed up a dummy!”

“_Why_?”

“Because he’s a paranoid freak!”

“Lance?”

“Yeah?”

Hunk glanced around nervously. “Do you think… You think that maybe something weird _is_going on?”

“There _is_,” Pidge proclaimed, pushing their door open, “There is something really, _really _weird. All of the students with AB positive blood are disappearing off of the face of the earth, and no one seems to care! Incidentally, the _principal _is AB positive, and no one’s seen _him _for a while, either.”

“I’m sure Lotor has,” Hunk said dismissively, “The principal is his father, apparently.”

“Really? Do you know where he is? Can we talk to him?”

Lance was struck with a thunderbolt of _yikes_. “He’s… missing.”

Pidge’s eyes widened. “That’s it. That’s—oh my stars, that’s it. They’re picking off the students with the AB positive blood. They’re—I don’t know, _harvesting _them or something! I’ve got to go warn Nyma and Plaxum! And—you guys should warn Keith. Where is he?”

“You dell us,” Lance grumbled, “Psycho sed ub a dummy of hibself.”

Pidge hissed. “Are you sure _he _set it up?”

Lance snorted. “If sobeone dried do kidnap hib, there would be a _lod _bore blood around this roob, and probably a bunch of dead bodies, too.”

“So… you don’t know where he is? He’s MIA?”

“Yep.”

“You need to find him, okay? He’s a target.”

“_I’b _nod tracking hib down. Good luck, and good riddance,” Lance muttered.

“Lance, you don’t mean that,” Hunk protested.

Lance crossed his arms. “He broke by node. I do _too _mean id. If _anyone _needs do disappear, id’s _hib_.”

Pidge ran a hand through her bangs. “Okay. Okay, It’s almost curfew. I’ll go tell Plaxum and Nyma, and when Keith shows up, you tell him, okay? I’m going to try to get back into the school systems and take a quick look at the security feeds in the L wing.”

“Yeah, okay.”

Pidge disappeared down the hallways, and Lance leaned back on his bed. “You thing Keith’s dead in a didch sobewhere?”

“Lance, that’s horrible!”

Lance shrugged. “One can hope, righd?”

Xxx

Pidge shivered as she came through the hallways to her dorm. Everything was just so… _creepy_. She slipped into her room. Nyma and Plaxum hadn’t come back yet. She shrugged, trying to let unease chew on her. Her laptop came out, and she closed her eyes, trying to remember how she’d gotten into the school systems in the first place. Her fingers moved through muscle memory and she was in before she knew it, finding feeds. Her eyes widened, and she took a screen record, sending off an email to Lance and Hunk.

Pidge glanced around as the curfew bell rang. Nyma and Plaxum were nowhere in sight. Her face paled visibly.

“No… no, no, no!”

She bolted through the hallways, going for Allura’s office, but she was stopped by a huge wall of muscle.

“It’s after curfew,” Sendak rumbled.

“Yes, sir, I’m sorry,” Pidge stammered, “I’m looking for my roommates—they’re not in our room, and I’m worried—”

“Nyma and Plaxum graduated,” Sendak said in a strangely distant tone, “Don’t worry about them.”

Pidge knew what _graduated _meant, and she realized too late that their belongings were missing from their dorm room. “Oh—have they left? Can I say goodbye?”

“They’re gone,” Sendak said hollowly, “But we’ve tracked down a hacking signal. It’s coming from your room.”

Pidge’s blood turned to ice. “Uh—well—I—”

Sendak’s hand latched onto her wrist, squeezing hard enough that Pidge was sure he was going to break her wrist. She yelped, but was ignored. “You and I need to have a little chat.” A few security guards came up too, surrounding Pidge. “Ms. Holt needs to go to my office. I’ll be there shortly. There’s something I have to deal with, first.”

Xxx

Lance was flicking through his phone when an email notification rang. He pulled it up. It was from Pidge.

_Forget Keith, he can wait. I’ve gotten into the L wing footage, and this is something you ****need ****to see. Get over here as fast as possible. It’s worse than we thought_.

“Hunk, we’re going on a field drip,” Lance announced, “How good are you ad sneaking?”

The hallways were surprisingly empty as they made their way to Pidge’s room. Sendak was waiting for them.

“Uh—”

“You shouldn’t be out.” Sendak didn’t sound angry, just matter-of-fact.

Hunk piped up. “Yeah, sorry, homework assignment, Pidge said we could get it—”

“Ms. Holt has suffered an unfortunate accident,” Sendak said in a flat tone, “She’ll be gone for the next few days.”

Lance gulped. “Ah…”

“It’s nothing serious. Just a sprained wrist. We’ve taken her off-campus for treatment. Go back to bed.”

They turned around, and once they were out of earshot, Hunk’s face turned to a frown. “Bull.”

“Yeah, bud we can’d _confrond _anyone aboud id.”

When they got back to their room, Keith still wasn’t there. Hunk went to bed, but Lance stayed up, staring at the ceiling. Someone was picking students off. Pidge had discovered something, and now they’d taken her. It seemed like Lotor might have “graduated,” and who the hell even knew where Keith might be. Were he and Hunk next? Because they’d snooped?

There was a tap on the window, and Lance gave a short shriek. Hunk snorted once and then went back to snoring. Lance grabbed a book for protection and crept to the window, expecting to see a murderer, or maybe Sendak. Keith was outside, crouched on the ledge. He knocked again.

Lance glared, shook his head, and walked away. Keith knocked harder. Lance ignored him, putting a pillow over his ears, but a particularly hard knock made him worried that Keith would break the glass, so he went back with a pad of paper and a pen.

_You’re late, you can stay out there all night. Serves you right_.

Keith looked considerably grumpier, but shrugged. _Might drop this_, he mouthed, and held up a laptop. _Pidge’s _laptop.

Lance unlocked and opened the window. “You’re the worsd,” he grumbled.

“Whatever,” Keith said dismissively, climbing in the window, “The files have been locked down tight, and I can’t decrypt this thing. It’s probably too much to hope for that _you _can, right?”

Lance shook his head. “Hunk mighd be able do, bud he’s sleeping righd now.”

Keith glanced at the snoring boy.

“Don’d even think aboud id. He won’d wake up.”

Keith sighed. “Fine.” He slid the computer under his mattress and crawled under the covers. His breathing evened out, and Lance crept towards the bed, reaching for the corner of laptop that was sticking out from under the matress.

Keith’s hand shot out and gripped his wrist in a vise-like hold. “Don’t even try it. Don’t even let the thought cross your mind.”

Lance crinkled his nose, but went back to his bed. Laptop or no, he shouldn’t have let Keith in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hooooooly moley, this plot is moving VERY fast.


	6. Chapter 6

Lance was woken up by the sound of keys clicking. Hunk was busy typing away on Pidge’s laptop. “Hey, you still have your hands attached!”

“Yeah,” Hunk said evenly, “Why wouldn’t I?”

Lance rolled his eyes. “Keith is very possessive of his things that he’s stolen from other people.”

“He gave it to me,” Hunk said amiably, “Asked if I could decrypt it.”

“Can you?”

Hunk frowned thoughtfully at the screen. “I think so. Give me time. Lots of algorithms here. Keith thinks whatever is on here is really important.”

“Speaking of whom, where _is _Mr. Scary-McIntimidateyou?”

“Hey, your nose doesn’t sound bad anymore! Oh, and Keith’s gone to breakfast.” Hunk looked up. “Do… do you think maybe Pidge was right? Do you think he’s in danger?”

Lance snorted. “Keith? No. Anyone who wants to _put _him in danger? They are _absolutely _in danger, we should really watch out for them.”

“_Lance_. I’m _serious_.”

Lance rolled his eyes. “You heard Shiro and Sendak. The guy has a history. He can probably handle himself.”

“A history of violence doesn’t mean that he can actually defend himself. Besides, what if they just drug his food? Or taser him?”

Lance sighed. “Look, okay, we’ll keep an eye on him, but if the guy doesn’t want to be found, we won’t be able to find him. Come on, we’ll be late.”

Hunk pushed the laptop into his backpack, and they stopped by the cafeteria for a quick bite before Lance headed to Physics. Sendak was there.

“Where’s Shiro?” Lance blurted.

“Mr. Shirogane is sick,” Sendak said blankly, “He’ll be back tomorrow. I’m your sub for today.”

“Oookay, he said he was going to move me—”

“There were no seating chart changes left behind.” Sendak nodded to his desk, where Keith was already sitting. “Go to your seat.”

Lance slouched over, pointedly ignoring Keith.

“We have group project; you can’t ignore me forever.”

Keith’s usual acerbic tone was shot with an undertone of worry. Lance decided to break silence. “Missing big brother?” he sniped, “Not looking forward to a class with the head of discipline, discipline case that you are?”

Keith went into a glowering silence, shoulders tense, and Lance knew he’d hit a nerve. Part of him debated pushing further, but his nose still kind of hurt, so he decided to leave it be.

The bell rang, and class started. Keith and Lance worked on the lab—an egg drop—in silence, until Sendak stopped keeping quite as sharp of an eye on them. Keith’s shoulders stopped tensing quite so much.

“Now Shiro’s missing.”

Lance made a dismissive noise. “He’s not missing, he’s sick. You’re seeing shadows and conspiracies everywhere where there are none. Maybe something weird is going on, but not everything is involved with it.”

“But—”

“Keith, you don’t get it—you’re over-paranoid, okay? Just admit it, you’re _way _over-analyzing this and making mountains out of molehills. Students are graduating, Pidge will be back in a few days, Mr. Shiro has just got a fever, or maybe he’s just sick of _you_and your batty conspiracy theories.”

“No, _you _don’t get it,” Keith hissed, “_I _told Shiro something fishy was going on. He promised to look into it. Now he’s gone! That doesn’t seem in the _slightest _suspicious to you?!”

Lance snorted. “Yeah, he’s taking a day off so you won’t bug him with your bulletin board and string.”

Keith’s expression was looking stormier by the second, but Lance didn’t stop.

“You need to take it down a few notches. Did it ever occur to you that there might be a _reason_that people don’t like you? Maybe there’s a _reason_that when you look around a room, you can’t call anyone in it a friend!”

Keith was now steadily ignoring him, his jaw clenched tightly, and his fingers equally tight on the desk.

“Maybe because you’re violent. What exactly _did _you do?”

There was a snapping noise, and then Keith marched out of the room, his fingers clenched into tight fists. Lance looked down at the table. Keith had gripped it so tightly that he’d cracked the wood. Lance gulped. If Keith was that strong…

Sendak made his way over. “What’s going on over here?”

“Keith had to go to the bathroom,” Lance lied.

“And _what _did you do to the desk?”

Lance felt a bead of sweat drip down the back of his neck. “It’s been like that.”

“Hm.”

To Lance’s relief, Sendak moved on, and class was over soon. Lance scooted out of class, striding down the hallways.

He didn’t make it to his next class.

Xxx

Keith punched the wall of the bathroom, bruising his knuckles. He didn’t care. Stupid, stupid, stupid—stupid him, stupid _Lance_, who’d provoked him—he’d already broken the guy’s nose, did his stupid roommate have a death wish?! Keith punched the wall again, biting down on his other fist to keep from screaming.

Shiro was missing, and no one seemed to _care_. And it was _his fault_. _He’d _told Shiro to investigate, and now… His fist thudded into the wall again. _Stupid_. _Impulsive. Can’t control your temper_. He punched the wall, and this time the skin on his knuckles split, red staining the wall.

Keith shook his head, the sharp pain clearing his mind. He needed to find Shiro. Shiro could help him, and maybe, just maybe, calm him down enough that he didn’t want to _push Lance_out of a _third-story window_!

Keith took a deep breath. He hadn’t lost his temper like this since… stars, since the day he’d really lost it and gotten sent here. Of course, he’d lost it plenty before, but normally, no one seemed to care. Keith took another deep breath.

He needed to find Shiro. He needed to find Pidge, while he was at it, and Lotor, and those other three girls—whatever their names were. But Shiro took priority. Yes. Shiro could fix things. That was what Shiro was good at.

_Hasn’t managed to fix **me **yet_, he thought ruefully and opened the door to the bathroom. His knuckles were still bleeding, so he hid them under his sleeves. Keith made his way to the library. The passageway was locked, but he still might be able to pop the lock.

A few students were waiting for him, a shaking Lance between them. Keith ignored them.

“Hey! Kogane!”

Oh, yeah, he’d messed that guy up pretty bad. Eh. Whatever.

“Kogane! We’ve got your little friend!”

Keith snorted to himself. They couldn’t have been further off if they tried. Maybe if they’d kidnapped Hunk he would have stepped in because, well, he couldn’t decrypt things on his own. But Lance? Yeah, they could _have him_.

“Did you hear us? We have McClain!”

Keith walked down an aisle. “You’re welcome to him,” he called.

Xxx

Lance stared in disbelief as Keith disappeared. Okay. Okay, he’d said some pretty bad things, albeit true things that Keith needed to be told, but _seriously_?! Keith was just going to _abandon _him?!

“Kogane! Get back here, or we turn him into mincemeat!”

Lance gulped. He rather enjoyed _not _being mincemeat, thank you very much!

“Okay, you have fun with that,” Keith’s voice called from somewhere in the maze of bookshelves.

“We’re serious!”

“So am I! Bye!”

“Keith!” Lance yelped.

“According to _you,_Lance, I don’t _have _any friends, so they’re not holding anyone hostage.”

“Oh, come on! I didn’t mean it! I was annoyed! Keith? Man? You out there?”

There was no response.

“Mincemeat time.”

Lance twisted and flailed like a fish on a line. The top of his head collided with something hard, and he backed away, blinking stars out of his eyes.

“You little runt!” his kidnapper had gotten Lance’s head to his chin. “I’ll kill you for that!”

Lance bolted for it, sprinting through the shelves with the maddened bully chasing behind him. He ran into a dead end and winced. He looked up. Keith was on top of the bookshelves. “A little help?!”

Keith shrugged. “Nah.”

“Come on!”

“Nope. _You _are the _worst_.”

Lance shifted from one foot to the other, glancing behind him. “If I say that you’re absolutely right and Shiro has probably been kidnapped or something will you help me?!”

“Maybe. Probably not.”

Lance blew out a panicked breath. His wounded antagonist was getting closer. “Look, I’m sorry, okay?! I’m stressed, one of my friends disappeared, and you’re probably next, so even being near you is kind of freaking me out, and, let’s face it, you’re not exactly easy to be around in the best of times, let alone with all of this other stuff, just please, please, _please _don’t let him get me!”

Keith considered that for a minute, then gave a deep sigh, like Lance was asking a _huge _favor. “Mmmmmmmmmmm…. Fiiiiiine.” He offered Lance a hand, and hauled him to the top of the bookshelf. “Sh.”

Their common enemy charged by, looking left and right, but never up. Then he was gone. “People never look up,” Keith said satisfactorily. Then he pushed on a ceiling tile, shoving it up.

“What are you _doing_?!”

“Finding another way into the L wing,” Keith said like it should be obvious, and started to hoist himself up into the ceiling.

“You just _pushed a ceiling tile up_!”

“Yeah, the tiles are loose. All schools are like this.”

“You’re _nuts_!”

“Yeah, you said that during Physics. I’m going to find Shiro.”

“No. No, no, no, no, no!” Lance grabbed Keith’s ankle. “Nope. You are _not_doing this. Not right here, right now. No. Just _wait_.”

“For _what_?!”

“Sendak said Shiro would be back tomorrow. And Pidge should be there, too. Just wait, like, one more day, and if they’re not back, _then_you can go crawling around in the ceiling.”

Keith came back down, sitting on his haunches and giving Lance a glare. “Why do _you_care? You said that I was next—you’re in league with them?! Is that it?! You’re trying to keep me from doing anything until they can get me?!”

“No! Stars, turn the paranoia down a notch, okay?!” Lance blew out a short breath. “Look, Pidge thinks they’re picking off the students with AB positive blood. You’re one of those lucky few. We don’t _actually_know if you’re next, it’s just guesswork.”

“If I’m next…” Keith went quiet. “That’s a problem.”

Lance gave a hysterical laugh. “Ya _think_?! You understand why maybe, just maybe, I feel a little uncomfortable around you?!”

“You don’t want to be singled out as a target by being near a target,” Keith said simply, “Understandable.” He glanced around. “Don’t worry. I have _no _intention of being a target.”


	7. Chapter 7

Lance stared up at the ceiling. It was morning, but it was a Saturday, and he wasn’t getting up if he didn’t have to, unlike Keith who was already gone who-knew-where. “Hunk?”

Hunk’s sleepy voice came from underneath him. “Mm?”

“Why do you think the AB positive students are disappearing?”

“I don’t know. It would make sense for O negative, but AB positive… it’s really weird.”

“What?”

Hunk yawned. “Well, if blood type matters, it might make sense if they were using students as a blood farm. But AB positive blood is next to useless. AB positive people can receive blood from anyone, but can only give blood to other AB positive people.”

“Okay, so not a blood farm. Got it. Still weird, though.”

“Might be a coincidence.”

Lance shook his head. “I don’t think that _anything _that happens here is a coincidence.”

“You sound like Keith.”

“_Yuck_.”

Hunk laughed. “You want to go to breakfast?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

He was up and dressed fairly quickly, and when they got to the cafeteria, Hunk’s face broke out into a grin.

“Pidge! You’re back!”

She smiled at them politely. She was wearing the girl’s uniform, one wrist wrapped in plaster. “Hi.”

Hunk and Pidge ran up towards her, grinning like maniacs. Lance leaned in. “So, what did you find out?” he whispered.

She looked at him blankly. “Find out about what?”

“You know… with the security feeds.”

She blinked at him placidly, uncomprehending. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lance felt his confidence start to crumble, worry taking over. “You know? On your computer? You hacked the school?”

Pidge laughed. “I wouldn’t ever do something like that! Where did you get that idea? I barely know how to filter an Internet search: how on Earth would I hack something?”

Lance looked closer at her, but she didn’t seem to be faking. Hunk blinked slowly. “Pidge?”

She waved her good hand. “Oh, please don’t call me that anymore, Hunk. Just Katie is fine. I don’t need a childish nickname anymore.”

Lance and Hunk looked at each other in dismay. What had happened to Pidge?!

Xxx

Keith knocked on Shiro’s office door.

“Come in,” Shiro’s voice called.

Relief flooded through Keith. He wasn’t kidnapped. Lance had been right: Shiro had just been sick. He pushed the door open.

“Shiro, I was worried!”

Shiro gave him a puzzled, slightly-glazed look. “Why? I just had a fever, Keith. Nothing to worry about.”

“I just thought—maybe—I asked you to look into that thing—and I thought maybe something bad had happened to you.”

Shiro sighed. “You’re too paranoid, Keith.”

Keith’s veins turned to ice. “Wh-What?”

“You heard me.”

“I—”

“There’s nothing going on in the L wing.” Shiro’s voice was overly firm, and his expression was stormy, but still slightly glazed. “Stop breaking the rules to get in there.”

“But Shiro, I—”

“No, Keith! Stop it! There is _nothing _wrong! You’re being over-imaginative!”

Keith felt hot tears spring to his eyes. “I—Shiro—I saw—”

“Stop whining, Keith, and stop bothering me.”

“Sh-Shiro?”

“Didn’t you hear me?! Get out! Go away! Stop pestering me with your _stupid _conspiracy theories!”

Keith backed away, then turned and ran, gulping back tears as he dashed through the hallways. Shiro had—Shiro was—no, something had to be wrong, Shiro wouldn’t—

Keith ran out the doors, out onto the grounds and into the trees, tripping over a branch. He curled his knees to his chest, leaning his back against a tree trunk.

First Lance.

Now Shiro.

_Are they right? Is there something wrong with me_?

Xxx

“They’ve _lobotomized _her!” Lance whispered to Hunk. They were watching Pidge from a distance as she ate her breakfast with a blank stare and smile.

“Normally I’d say that’s ridiculous, but honestly, I’m inclined to agree!” Hunk whispered back, “It’s like she’s been… been…”

“Oh my stars,” Lance whispered, “She said that all of the students who she could find out in the world are boringly normal! Do you think they do this to _everyone_?!”

Hunk gulped. “I hope not! Do you think so? Oh, stars, they _do_, don’t they? I bet they do!”

Lance stared in horror at Pidge, who blithely continued to eat her cereal. “What do you think they did?!”

“L wing, probably!” Hunk looked around. “You know, I haven’t seen Keith around…”

“You think they got him?!”

“Well, I haven’t seen any puddles of blood recently, so I’d say no.”

“Why, Hunk, you sounded positively acidic!” Lance glanced back at Pidge. “Seriously. What do you think they did to her?”

“Drugs, maybe?”

“Drugs… but they’d have to constantly give her drugs!”

“Maybe…” Hunk broke off. “No. They wouldn’t. They wouldn’t be _allowed_! That’s got to be _illegal_.”

“What? What is it?”

“No. It’s illegal. They _couldn’t_.”

“Just tell me.”

Hunk glanced at Pidge and lowered his voice. “Brainwashing or conditioning with, like… electroshock.”

Lance’s jaw dropped. “They wouldn’t… would they?” He glanced around and shivered. “What if they tasered Keith and they _do_have him? Do you think we’ll be next because we keep poking around? Or—what if, I don’t know, they’re using Pidge as a spy, now? Like, they can control her, and she’ll report to them? Do you think she’s spying on us?”

“I don’t know,” Hunk replied.

“What’s wrong?” Pidge asked.

Lance jumped. He hadn’t noticed her coming up to them, still with that vacant stare. “Nothing. Just trouble on a math problem.”

Pidge wrinkled her nose. “Oooh, yeah, math is hard. I’m going to try to transfer out of Calculus, I think. I don’t know _what_was going through my head when I chose my courses.” She grinned at them. “I guess I’ll go talk to Allura.”

She wandered away, and Lance shivered. “_Creepy_.”

Hunk was staring after her, open-mouthed. “She was top of our class!” he protested, “They’ve destroyed her, whatever they’ve done!”

Lance snapped his fingers. “Allura! We should tell her! She can help!”

Hunk shook his head. “Allura is the one who told Pidge that Florona had graduated. We don’t know if we can trust her.”

“But she was looking for Lotor…” A chill ran down Lance’s spine as a thought occurred to him.

Hunk stiffened, as if the same thought had hit him. “What if…”

“No. No, Hunk, don’t. Don’t say it.”

Hunk pushed on anyway. “What if Lotor figured it out? What if he found out he was next, and made a run for it, or was hiding from them. What if Allura was looking for him to catch him?”

Lance’s knees went weak, and he collapsed. “We can’t trust anyone.” The enormity of the situation caught up to him, and he put a hand to his mouth. “Anyone could be in on it! There’s no one we can trust! Keith—oh my stars, Keith was right! He might be super paranoid, but he was _right_!”

Hunk helped him up. “We need to find him. We thought he was nuts, but maybe…”

Lance nodded. “He might be the only one who knows what’s going on.”

Xxx

By the time curfew had rolled around, Lance and Hunk had searched the whole school building while at the same time avoiding Pidge, but had seen no sign of Keith. Hunk was out the minute his head hit the pillow, but Lance stayed up, his brain whirling through all of the possibilities. Pidge might be under someone’s control—whose, Sendak’s? The principal must have been taken out—no one seemed to have seen him, and he was AB blood. He had probably been the first to be subjected to the horrors of the L wing.

Was it Allura? She had easy access to the students. She _could _do it. But if she was, she was a pretty good actor. He’d _never _suspect her, not in a _million _years.

Something tapped, and Lance rolled out of bed. Keith was outside the window. Lance considered leaving him locked out there, just because _he’d wasted a whole Saturday looking for him _and _right _when Lance actually _wanted _to see his stupid face, he was _nowhere_, but he unlatched the window and opened it.

“Don’t make a habit of this,” he warned.

“Sorry,” Keith muttered, climbing through. His eyes were red, and Lance realized that Keith had just apologized. _Keith_. Keith _never _apologized, the bastard. Something must be horribly, _terribly _wrong.

_Stay out of it_, Lance told himself, _you don’t need to be getting any more broken noses_.

Lance ignored himself. “Hey, are you okay?”

Keith sniffed, going towards his bed. “I’m fine.”

“Where were you all day?”

“What is this, the Spanish Inquisition?”

“No, I—Keith?”

“Shiro’s back,” Keith said.

“Oh! Great! Okay. Hey. About the L wing.”

“Forget about the L wing.”

“No, seriously, we think you’re right! There’s something _seriously _wrong going on down there, and—”

“No.”

Lance blinked. “What?”

“Shiro, ah… he looked into it. Said there’s nothing going on.” Keith wiped at his eyes, avoiding looking Lance in the eye. “I—I was just being paranoid.”

The word echoed in Lance’s head. That didn’t seem right. “Wait… Did Shiro tell you that you were being paranoid?”

Keith shrugged. “So what if he did? He—uh—you were—yeah. He’s sick of me.” He shrugged again. “It’s no big deal.”

Lance could see that it was a _very _big deal. “Are you okay?”

“I’m _fine_,” Keith said aggressively, “Just… leave me alone.”

“Um… it doesn’t really… seem like a Shiro thing to do. Saying that, I mean.”

Keith swiped at his eyes again, glaring at the ground. “No. He wasn’t being very Shiro-like.”

Lance took a deep breath. “Pidge was back today. She… wasn’t very Pidge-like.”

Keith’s head whipped up. “What do you mean?!”

“I mean, she thought math was hard, and she didn’t know how to do computer things. Hunk thinks…” Lance looked around, as if someone might be lurking in the corner. “He thinks that they might have used electroshock therapy to mess with her. Change her.”

Keith stared at him, eyes wide. “You think… you think they did it to Shiro?”

Lance nodded grimly. “The Shiro who’s been teaching us wouldn’t have made you cry.”

Keith’s hands balled into fists. “I wasn’t crying!”

Lance raised his hands in surrender. “Sorry, sorry, okay, you weren’t crying. You just had an allergic reaction to rejection. My bad.”

Keith ran a hand through his bangs. “It’s my fault,” he breathed, sliding down the wall and landing on the floor with a _thump_. “I asked him to investigate, and he got caught, and—” Keith looked up at Lance. “Do you think there’s a way to reverse it?”

Lance bit his lip. “I—I don’t know.”

“You mean… he and Pidge… could be like this forever?”

“I guess.”

Keith gave a sharp nod, like that settled something. “Tomorrow.”

Lance frowned. “Sorry?”

“I’m going into the L wing tomorrow. I’m going to figure this out once and for all, and I’m going to shut it down.”

“Uh…”

“You’re not coming.”

“Okay. But… I thought you said you wanted to stay here and ride it out without getting kicked out? Shutting down the school will have the same effect.”

“Simple,” Keith replied, “I find whoever is in charge of this. I kill them. School continues.”

He said it so matter-of-factly that Lance was taken aback. “Just like that, you’ll murder someone?!”

“Lance, it’s a pre-emptive strike to defend myself, not murder.”

“You’re nuts, you know that?”

The ghost of a smile crossed Keith’s face. “I believe that’s why I’m here.”

“You never _did _tell me why.”

Keith’s nose twitched. “I bashed someone’s face in. Several people, actually, but I only got caught once.” He shrugged. “Eh. Here beats my old high-school, honestly.”

Lance sat down on the floor with a _whump_. “Rewind. What?!”

Keith shrugged again. “Several of them were foster siblings. I got tired of having the living snot beaten out of me one day and decided to fight back.” His expression darkened. “Notice that none of _them _are going here. No one ever caught them. They got off scot free, and _I’m _the violent one.”

“I… I’m sorry.”

Keith shrugged again. “It’s not a big deal.”

Lance looked at him curiously, Hunk snoring in the background. “Why do you always say that?”

“What?”

“Say it’s not a big deal. It _is_a big deal to you, it’s obvious. So why do you always say that it’s not?”

Keith curled his knees to his chest. “I—I don’t know. Reflex, I guess. Don’t want people making a fuss over me.”

Lance was quiet for a moment. He was _not_prepared to deal with a vulnerable Keith, and he wanted to think through what he said carefully. “What happened? Back when you were bashing people’s faces in?”

Keith rested his chin on his knees. “Lots of stuff. This might surprise you, but I used to be kind of… angry. All of the time.”

Lance feigned surprise. “You?! Really?! No!”

“Shut up. It was worse. I’ve been tame, comparatively. Back then… every little thing would set me off. It was the only way to make sure no one messed with me. I mean, you’re not going to try to mess with the kid who punches back, right? But, I mean… sometimes people still did.”

Lance gulped. “Um…”

Keith sighed, leaning his head back against the wall. “I was doing better. I wasn’t ever, you know, a good kid. I always did my own thing, stopped treating adults with respect—they didn’t like me much anyway, so I didn’t see why I should have to be polite. But I wasn’t being a rage ball.”

“What happened?” Lance asked quietly.

Keith lifted his shoulders in a half-hearted shrug. “Someone purposely tripped me in the hallway and tried to push my head into the ground, and I snapped. Next thing I knew, they were in the hospital and I was in a police station. I got sent here, where I promptly punched someone else for pushing me in the hallway.” He shrugged again. “High-school is high-school no matter _where_you are, I guess.”

He got up, climbing into bed. 

“Sharing time is over. Talk about this with anyone, and—”

Lance rolled his eyes. “Let me guess, you’ll push me out a window?”

“Or something like that.”

Lance shrugged, climbing the ladder to the top of the bed. Part of him was turning over what Keith had said, matching up his past to the person he was now and putting his judgement of Keith under a new lens.

The other part of him wondered if Keith had told him because he didn’t think he’d make it out of the L wing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go boys


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I know how to say approximately four things in Spanish, and this chapter contains three of them.

“You’re absolutely sure about this?”

Keith rolled his eyes as he climbed into the ceiling. “Yes, I’m sure about this! Why are you here? I told you that you weren’t coming!”

“I’m not. I’m just recording your last words.”

Keith poked his head out, glaring. “Not funny.”

Lance shivered. “Okay, yeah, not funny. Good luck.”

Keith disappeared, and Lance heard rustling up in the ceiling as he moved away.

“Laaaaance,” a voice sing-songed, and Lance’s blood chilled. What’s-his-face, he was coming. And he was getting closer. Lance scrambled up the bookshelves as the bully turned the corner.

“Oh, no you don’t!”

A hand grasped for Lance’s ankle, and Lance kicked it away, grabbing the edge of the ceiling and struggling to haul himself up. The other student was too big and heavy to follow him. Hopefully. 

“You’ll have to come down eventually!

_Yeah, but I doubt you have the patience to wait for me_. Lance crawled up through the ceiling, staying on the solid beams as much as possible. He scrambled across the beams quickly, running into something squishy.

“_Lance_!”

Lance tried for a grin. “Uh, hi!”

Keith glared at him, his face lit up dimly by a flashlight app. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

“Yeah, change of plans. I kind of… didn’t have much of a choice. Well, I did, but the other choice was to get my face smashed in. Any chance I could join on the adventure?

Keith sighed. “Fine, but you keep your mouth shut. Be quiet.”

“Okey-dokey. I will keep my mouth shut. I can do that. A silent ninja, that’s me. No words, not a sound, no sir, not coming from—”

“_Lance_!”

“Shutting up now.”

“Good.”

Lance crawled after Keith in the ceiling, and then Keith lifted out another tile and jumped down.

Lance dangled and dropped after him, looking around. Yep. They were in the L wing, alright. “Bingo, baby,” he muttered to himself.

“Shh.”

They crept silently through the abandoned wing. Keith peered in a window, and stumbled back, eyes wide. “No _way_,” he spat, “There is _no way_!”

Lance peered in as well, and coughed, _loudly_. “What the…?!” There were two girls in a massive tank filled with water. They had _tails_. And _gills_.

Oh, and they were Florona and Plaxum.

“What the _hell_?!” Keith said quietly.

“That’s—” Lance stammered, “How—those are—Pidge’s roommates—that’s—how—oh, my stars—how—what-?!”

Keith’s face got even more horrified. “Those are _Pidge’s roommates_?! I thought—I thought maybe they found them—they got fished out of the ocean—but—”

“No! They used to be—just—they were normal humans, and now—”

“Damn,” Keith whispered quietly, and Lance was _incredibly _tempted to call him out for swearing, but decided that this was one of those situations where there really were no other words that adequately captured the situation.

“Yeah,” Lance agreed bleakly. And then he said something a whole lot ruder than “damn.”

Keith shook his head. “We—we need to keep moving,” he said shakily, and Lance was hit suddenly with the fact that collected, unflappable Keith was rattled, and that meant that he should _really _be running around screaming right now.

Keith kept walking, running a shaking hand through his bangs, swearing under his breath. Lance followed, his legs slightly wobbly.

“What are we going to do about them? We can’t just leave them.”

“We take down whoever is behind this, and then we can let them free.” Keith’s usual conviction was replaced with shaky insecurity, and it occurred to Lance suddenly that if they got caught, _Keith _would be the one in the fish tank, and he’d be wandering around the school staring at everything blankly like Pidge.

Keith found an unlocked room, and they slipped in, flipping on a lightswitch. Lance’s eyes widened.

“Lotor?!”

The class president looked up at them from where he was shackled to the floor, his eyes wide and, Lance saw with a heave in his stomach, _glowing_.

“What—what’s happening to me?” he whispered, “My hands…” He held them out, trembling like a leaf. “I’m growing claws, I—” he gulped. “Help me,” he choked.

“Your hair is turning white,” Keith marveled, “And your skin…”

Lance gulped. “It’s turning purple.”

Lotor shivered. “What—I—he’s my _father_, why would he—why?”

Lance’s blood chilled. “Your father?” 

Keith frowned. “The principal is behind this?”

Lotor nodded. “He—I don’t know, he’s trying to figure out how to alter people, and…”

“Why the AB positive students?” Keith demanded, “Why is he targeting them?!”

Lotor shivered. “They can accept blood from any other blood type. He’s using that to introduce new genetics through blood transfusions. Please—you have to help me—I found out that the AB positives were disappearing, and I tried to run, but…” He gulped. “Don’t leave me here, please!”

“Pidge!” Lance remembered, “Pidge, she disappeared after you! Did you see her?”

Lotor nodded. “They… they brainwashed her. That’s how they turn out model citizens. They use some kind of… hypnosis, or something, and on the more stubborn ones, they… they…”

“What?! What do they do?!”

“Electricity,” Lotor said quietly.

Hunk had been right. Electroshock. Brainwashing. And… none of them had predicted genetic manipulation. But _seriously_! How?! Why?!

Footsteps echoed down the hallway, and Lance looked to Keith. “Nice knowing you.”

Keith took a place on one side of the door, flattening himself against the wall. He nodded to the other side, and Lance flattened up too.

“When I say run, you go back for the hole in the ceiling,” Keith whispered.

“I can’t reach it! And I can’t exactly jump that far!”

“I’m not planning on getting caught, okay?! Don’t worry about it!”

The door opened, and Keith stuck his foot out, tripping Sendak.

“RUN!”

Lance bolted for it, scrambling down the hallway. Lotor had managed to get one of his chains around Sendak’s throat and was holding him back. Keith was behind Lance, waving his arms.

“Go, go, go!”

When they reached the hole, Keith used Lance like a ladder and got into the hole, grabbing Lance’s arms and yanking him up. They scrambled through the roof, Sendak bellowing behind them. Finally, they came out in the library again. The bully was waiting for them.

“Finally!” He cracked his knuckles. “It’s about time we settled this, once and—”

Keith jumped down, knocking him out cold with a jab to a fleshy spot behind his ear. “Oh, shut _up_,” he muttered irritably.

Sendak was coming through the halls. Lance could hear him yelling. Keith threw open a window, and they crawled out onto the roof. Keith slid down a drainpipe, and Lance let out a deep breath, going after him with a yelp, trying his hardest not to scream. They went back through the front doors and ran through the hallways, scooting into the safety of their dorms. Keith slammed the door, leaning his back across it. Hunk looked up from Pidge’s laptop, startled.

“Hah… hah… I think… we lost them…” Keith slid down the door, panting. “Whoooooof.”

Lance collapsed on the floor. “Oh my stars,” he yelped, “Madre de Dios! What the _whack _just _happened_?! How are we _alive_? We’re pendejo!”

“Not a very nice thing to say about yourself,” Hunk chided from where he was sitting on his bed, clicking away at Pidge’s computer, “What happened, and how bad was it that you’re being bilingual?”

“English, please,” Keith panted.

Lance pointed a finger at him. “Cierra la boca! You got us into this in the first place!”

Keith looked at Hunk for help.

“He told you to shut up,” Hunk translated.

Keith glared at Lance. “I also got us _out _of it.”

Lance tilted his head towards Hunk. “Do we…”

“Go ahead.”

Lance shifted uncomfortably. “Um. Well. You were right, Hunk!”

“About what?”

“Pidge has been brainwashed,” Keith said quickly, “Pidge has been brainwashed, they’re trying genetic manipulation on our classmates, the principal is behind it all, and Sendak is helping him.”

“And apparently, I missed some conversation,” Hunk said with a frown, “Because somewhere along the line, we got friendly enough to _not _be breaking noses.”

“Yes. That too.”

Lance craned his neck upward. “What do we do now?”

“_You _do nothing,” Keith said firmly, “You’re done. _I’m _going to take care of it. Just keep your heads down and everything will be fine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand today, I decided, you know what? I don't WANT to do extensive research for this fan fiction, we're just going to jump straight into the deep end of "heck if I know how this works", screw actual, like, biology and genetics and real science.


	9. Chapter 9

Lance and Hunk were in the library when it happened. There was a loud wailing, and the P.A. crackled to life. “All students, stay where you are, we are under lockdown. This is not a drill. I repeat, this is not a drill.”

Lance glanced at Hunk. “Keith?”

“Probably.”

Lance rubbed his arms as goosebumps crept up them. “Hey, Hunk? Do you think that there’s a way to undo the brainwashing?”

Hunk frowned, his eyes distant and unfocused. “A sharp, sudden pain might shock them out of it.”

Allura came into the library, her face worried. “Lance? Hunk?”

“Yeah?”

“Keith, he, uh… he just attempted to kill the principal. Have you guys… did he ever give any indication that he was… I don’t know, murderous?”

“No,” Lance lied.

Gunshots sounded, and Lance ran to the window, closely followed by Allura and Hunk. Outside on the grounds, he could see a small figure in a red jacket tearing away in a zig-zag pattern. There were more gunshots, but Keith seemed to ignore them, disappearing into the trees.

“Lethal force?!” Hunk asked, “Really?!”

“He tried to kill someone,” Allura said quietly, “The principal will recover, but…” She shook herself. “Hunk, Sendak wants to see you.”

“Right now?!” Hunk squeaked, “We’re on lockdown!”

Allura nodded out the window. “I don’t think you’re going to run into Keith out in the hallways.”

Hunk shook, but got up and left, followed by Allura. The door closed behind them in a final kind of way.

Xxx

After lockdown ended, Lance ran back to his room. There was a note pinned to his pillow, written in Hunk’s handwriting.

_Lance—_

_I cracked the encryptions on Pidge’s computer. We have video evidence. Go to the police._

But the computer was nowhere to be found. The evidence was gone.

Xxx

Lance couldn’t sleep. He stared at the ceiling, wide awake. Hunk hadn’t come back. They’d never found Keith, or if they had they hadn’t told anyone. He shivered. His friends were disappearing, like the school was eating them.

A slow tap sounded on the window, and hope bloomed in Lance’s chest. He scrambled down the ladder and shot to the window. Keith was outside, his face creased with exhaustion, holding one hand to his side.

Lance opened the window, and Keith fell through, clutching his side. He was breathing heavily, and Lance noticed the smear of red on the windowpane.

“…Keith?”

“Shot,” Keith croaked. He moved his hand long enough for Lance to see the hole in his side before pressing on the wound again. “It went all the way through, and… it’s bleeding really badly.” His head thudded against the wall. “I failed.” He looked around. “Where’s Hunk?”

Lance looked at the floor, gulping back tears. “Gone,” he said softly, finally admitting it to himself, “They took him away today.”

Keith closed his eyes. “Stars, I’m sorry, Lance. I…” he winced, pressing his hand against his side more firmly. “Urgh—ow…”

Lance tugged a blanket off of the unused top bunk, rummaging through his supply bag for a pair of scissors and cutting the sheet into long strips. “Here, let me see.”

Keith pulled up his shirt, revealing the gunshot hole, which was still bleeding profusely from both sides. Lance wadded up what was left of the sheet and pressed it to either side, putting pressure on the wound. Keith hissed in pain, but left him to it, eyes still closed.

“One Mississippi,” Lance whispered to himself, “Two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six Mississippi, seven Mississippi, eight Mississippi, nine Mississippi, ten Mississippi.” Lance removed his makeshift gauze pad. The wound was still emitting a slow trickle of blood, so Lance repeated his press. This time the bleeding didn’t continue. “Okay. Ooookay.” He took a deep, shaky breath. “You okay?”

“Just peachy,” Keith pushed out through gritted teeth, his face taught.

Lance had him sit up and wrapped the strips around him to keep the wound covered, tying a tight knot. “There. I’m not a doctor, but you probably won’t bleed out.”

“Thanks.” Keith slumped against the wall, still breathing shallowly. “You a boy scout or something?”

“Siblings. Not that any of them ever got shot, but I know first aid.” Lance was quiet for a minute. “What are you going to do now? Hunk thought—_thinks _that a sharp pain shock might break Pidge and Shiro out of it, but we don’t know for sure. Are you going to help them? What’s next? Do you have a plan?”

Keith looked at the clock. “Well, I’m going to sleep for seven hours. And then I’m going to get up, and I’m going to go to school.”

Lance gaped at him. “_What_?!”

Keith shrugged, wobbling to his bed. “It’s a Monday tomorrow.”

“Uh—what?! No! You can’t go to class! They’ll catch you!”

Keith grinned a joyless grin, slightly tight with pain. “They can _try_.”

“Keith, you just got _shot_! You can’t go gallivanting around! You need to rest!”

“Seven hours. I suggest you get some sleep too.”


	10. Chapter 10

“No. No _way_. You can’t _really _be planning to go through with this! You’ve been _shot_!”

Keith stiffly changed into his school uniform, the makeshift bandages stained red. “I’m going through with this. Truancy is a crime, Lance.”

“So is _attempted murder_!”

“You ever wonder why the school is out in the middle of nowhere?”

Lance frowned. “What do you mean?”

Keith finished buttoning his shirt and made his way to the door, hissing in pain. “The school—miles out—from civilization. No one—can call—the police—agh!” He fell, holding his injured side. “Okay. Okay, so this is… this hurts a lot more than I thought it would.”

“You got _shot_,” Lance reiterated.

“Oh, really? Hadn’t noticed.” Keith waved a hand. “You go to class. I’ll catch up.”

“You are _not_coming to class!”

“Yeah? Who’s going to stop me? You?”

“Yes?” Lance hated the way it came out like a question.

“You want a shiner to match your crooked nose?”

“I’m _sorry_, you need to _not_threaten people, Keith.”

“I’m going to class. End. Of. Story. Don’t try to stop me.”

“You’re going to get yourself _killed_!”

“Not an option,” Keith said grimly.

“Please, come on, Keith, you can’t even walk, how are you going to run if they start to chase you?”

A grim smile touched his lips. “I’m not planning on running.”

Lance scowled. “You know what? Fine. Just, well, _fine_! Go get yourself killed, or brainwashed or turned into some kind of weird mutant! Just don’t get me mixed up in your stupid coup!”

Lance stormed out the door, slamming it shut behind him. When he got to Physics, he saw that Shiro looked glazed, like Pidge. Class was boring, all equations and practice problems and worksheets instead of Mr. Shiro shoving things off of his desk at random and telling them to calculate the mass based on how fast it had fallen from his 1 meter desk.

About halfway through, Keith pushed the door open, ignoring the stares from the rest of the class and coming to sit down in his normal seat. Lance noted that the side of his shirt was stained crimson.

“_Stars, _Keith, you’re going to bleed out,” he said quietly.

“Nope,” Keith replied shortly, despite the fact that he looked like he was about to pass out, “Not happening.” He put his head down on the desk. “Just give me a shove if anything important happens.”

Class progressed, and then P.A. crackled over the speakers. _Keith Kogane, report to the principal’s office_.

Keith wobbled to his feet. “Time to finish it,” he murmured.

Lance put his head in his arms. “Oh my stars, you’re _actually _insane!” he whispered, “Or suicidal, I’m not sure which! Just… don’t mention _me_, okay?”

Keith pushed towards the door, and Lance winced as he looked at the empty seat. Keith had left blood on the desk.

_He’s bleeding too much. He’s going to die. He’s going to bleed out and die_!

_Not my problem. I tried to stop him, I tried to keep him from coming_.

_He’s going to get **killed**_!

Lance went through the rest of class in a daze, wondering what was happening. Had Keith managed to kill the principal? Had he gotten caught and dragged to the L wing? Was he busy naming all accomplices to try to save himself?

_Lance McClain, please report to Mr. Sendak’s office_.

Lance felt his stomach heave. They were going to grab him. They were going to brainwash him like Pidge! He considered making a run for it, but he knew the gate was guarded. There was nowhere to run.

He knocked tentatively on the office door and was admitted by a deep “come in.” He edged in, gulping.

“Sit.”

Lance sat. “Sir?”

“Your friends seem to be trouble.”

“I’m sorry, sir?”

“Katie Holt attempted to hack secure files. Hunk Garret attempted the same. And Keith Kogane attempted to kill the principal. _Twice_.”

Lance’s mouth went dry, and sweat started to bead his forehead, dripping down the back of his neck. “Did he…?”

“The principal, luckily, sustained only a stab wound to the arm. Kogane is in our custody.”

In the L wing then. “Okay. That’s good.”

Sendak leaned forward. “We’ve been asking him about accomplices.”

Lance leaned forward, putting his hands on the edge of Sendak’s desk, gripping the wood tightly. “Sir, whatever he told you, I—I didn’t really _want _to follow him into the L wing, but I was being chased, and I had to, and when he knocked on the window, I mean, I couldn’t just let him bleed out, so I let him in and—and—”

Sendak blinked. “McClain. McClain!”

Lance stopped. “Yes, sir?”

“I was just going to ask you if you’d noticed him planning something with anyone. One of the teachers. Or one of the teachers.”

Lance let go of the desk, blinking hard. “Um… I…”

“What exactly did you see in the L wing?” Sendak sounded genuinely curious. “I’ve been told it is just a burned-out building.”

Lance’s brain whirled. No. Not _possible_. Sendak had _been _there! Lance had _seen _him! There was _no way _that Sendak didn’t know what was going on!

“Lance. I want to help you. What did you see?”

“Uh—I saw—” Lance gulped. “I saw Pidge’s old roommates. Sir, they—they were—they—”

“Thank you, Lance, that’s all I needed.” All semblance of the confused, helpful Sendak disappeared, replaced with a ruthless enforcer of the principal’s bidding. “Come along, then.”

Lance started to scream. He didn’t care who heard him, as long as someone _came_, but something sharp hit him, and his tongue died in his mouth, all of his limbs going heavy.

_Oh_, he thought as he drifted off, _so, **that’s **how they got Keith_.

Xxx

“—riority one—”

“—ot stubborn—”

“Should respond—”

Lance pushed his eyes open, blinking groggily at his surroundings. Everything was starched white. He was sitting in a chair of some kind, like the ones in the dentist’s office. He tried to sit up, but something stopped him. Something around his wrists. Something else in his mouth.

He was shackled to the chair. Gagged.

A wave of panic swept over Lance, and he tugged at the restraints, yelling into the gag and generally putting up a fuss. A man in a white coat approached him, smiling.

“Hey, we’ll get those off of you in just a minute, okay? We just want to make sure you don’t hurt yourself, okay?” He gave another smile. “Work with us, and everything will be just fine.”


	11. Chapter 11

Lance blinked at his surroundings. Starched white. A sense of déjà vu flooded him, and he shook it away. It was a doctor’s office. Of _course _he’d been in a doctor’s office before.

Did doctor’s offices normally have restraints? Lance shook the thought away. Probably. A nice doctor let him out.

“How are you feeling?”

“Good!” Lance said brightly. His head was feeling a little fuzzy, but… he frowned. Why _would _that be? The word “ADHD” surfaced in his mind and he nodded in satisfaction. Yes. Probably his ADHD kicking in. That made sense.

He was led through a hallway to a room with another boy in it. Lance grinned in delight. “Hunk! Hey, you were gone yesterday!” _That _memory pushed through, crystal clear. What had been going on yesterday?

Hunk grinned back. “Yeah, I got a little sick. The doctors were helping me out.”

Lance nodded. “I think you gave me whatever you had.”

Hunk gave him a sheepish grin. “My bad. Sorry.”

“Stay right here,” the doctor told Lance.

“Hey, where _are _we?” Lance asked.

Hunk shrugged passively. “Does it matter?”

Lance thought about that for a minute. “No.”

The doctor returned with a girl, who grinned widely at them both. “Hunk! Lance!”

“Katie!”

“You guys got sick?”

“Yeah, Hunk gave it to me,” Lance said with a good-natured glare at Hunk.

“You three can go back to school, now,” the doctor told them, “You’re safe, and not contagious.”

“Thank you!” Hunk said cheerfully.

They walked towards the end of the hallway, chatting about nothing. A yelp of pain caught Lance’s attention, and he looked in a window. There was a boy their age inside with a crimson stain on his shirt, strapped down to a chair like Lance had been. Lance hadn’t had that thing wired to his head, though…

A doctor was inside, asking the boy something. The boy glared at him with burning violet eyes. Lance frowned. He felt like maybe he should know him. He was _kind of _familiar, like someone he’d seen a picture of, but…

Lance’s doctor loomed in front of them, blocking their view of the room. “Keep moving along, you three.”

The strange boy disappeared from Lance’s mind as they emerged into the rest of the school. Lance gave Hunk a worried look.

“Do you think we have homework?”

“You’ve been excused,” Pidge said brightly, “Because you were sick.”

Lance nodded. Made sense. Classes passed by in a flash. Physics was the easiest, with Mr. Shiro’s no-nonsense, textbook approach to the subject. English was a little harder, Mr. Coran a bit wilder and unconventional.

School passed on as normal, and Lance settled easily into the routine despite his absent day. Breakfast, classes, lunch, classes, homework, dinner, time to watch funny cat videos and then bed. He and Hunk and Pidge went outside sometimes, to get exercise. Runs, mostly. Lance had suggested climbing a tree once, but all three of them had come to the conclusion that it might be dangerous.

A week after the sickness, there was a knock on Hunk and Lance’s dorm room, and Mr. Sendak had walked in, a boy with violet eyes propelled in front of him. Lance felt kind of uneasy—hadn’t he seen this guy before? But Mr. Sendak started talking, and Lance snapped his attention to him.

“This is Keith. He’ll be dorming with you, okay?”

“Okay!” Hunk said cheerfully.

Keith was staring at them both like they were cousins who he hadn’t seen for years and had expected to be different. Lance shivered. His purple gaze was kind of unsettling, and his eyes were… almost desperate.

Sendak beckoned them away from Keith, who suddenly just looked tired. “Keith can be a little bit… unruly. He breaks the rules, sometimes.”

Lance felt sad. Why would he break the rules? The rules were there to keep them all safe! Did Keith want to get hurt or die? That was even more sad.

“We can help him!” Hunk suggested eagerly. Lance nodded emphatically. Yes! They could show Keith how to follow the rules! Then maybe, if he saw that they were happy following the rules, _he_would want to follow the rules.

Sendak smiled indulgently at them both. “Good. I knew I could rely on you two.” He patted them both on the shoulder. “Good luck.”

He closed the door, Keith still looking at them like they were long-lost family who had stabbed him in the back. Keith grabbed Hunk by the shoulders.

“Hunk? Buddy? Are you still in there?”

“Of course I am,” Hunk said, his brows drawn together in confusion, “Where else would I be?”

Keith shook him. “Snap out of it!”

“Hey,” Lance chided, “Don’t do that; it’s mean!”

Keith turned his wild, violet stare on Lance. “Lance? Come on, don’t—Do you even know who I am?”

Lance felt a small frown on his face. Déjà vu again. “You’re Keith. Our new roommate.”

“No! I was your roommate before—I broke your nose, for stars’ sakes! Don’t you remember?!” Keith was looking more and more panicked by the second.

Sendak hadn’t mentioned that Keith was kind of _crazy_. No _wonder _he broke the rules. “Do you need to see the nurse?” Lance asked politely, “Did you bump your head?”

“No! I—” Keith shook Lance by the shoulders. “Wake up!”

Lance pushed Keith away firmly. “Stop that.”

Keith slumped suddenly. “_Stars_,” he muttered, running a shaky hand through his bangs, “What are they—what is their game? Is this to psych me out? But why bother?!” He eyed Lance suspiciously. “Are they spies?” he murmured to himself, “Or…”

Lance frowned. “Keith? Are you okay?”

Keith gave him an unfathomable look. “No,” he replied quietly, “I’m not.”

Xxx

Allura clicked through her emails, mostly just quick-scanning them. Lance McClain and Hunk Garret had both been “sick” about a week ago. Most likely playing hookey, but they were both back now, and that was what mattered. Keith Kogane had been apprehended attempting to kill the principal for a second time. She shook her head. This wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment attack, which would have been consistent with Keith Kogane’s history. This was a targeted attack on the principal, and the principal alone.

The newest email caught her attention, and her eyes narrowed, the wheels in her mind clicking. What exactly was going on, here?

Xxx

“Lance!”

Lance looked up as Allura clicked through the halls towards him. “Good morning,” he said brightly.

“Yes—good morning—Lance, is Keith rooming with you?”

Lance nodded. “Yes, Ma’am.”

Allura frowned. “That can’t be right. Why would they…?”

“Ma’am?”

“Lance, do you know why they didn’t turn Keith over to the police?”

Lance frowned in confusion. “Why _would _they turn Keith over to the police? I mean, he’s a little… odd. But I don’t think he’s a criminal.”

Allura frowned at him, and Lance was suddenly aware that he must have said something wrong. “Lance, _everyone _here is a criminal. But besides that, he tried to kill the principal!”

Something pushed at a fuzzy spot in Lance’s mind. “When?”

“Just a week ago!”

Hm. Well, he’d been sick. It made sense that he didn’t know. “Weird. I don’t really remember hearing about that at all.”

Allura gave him an odd look. “Lance, I _told _you. I came to you and Hunk and told you two that Keith had tried to kill the principal!”

The fuzzy feeling was back with a vengeance as Lance struggled to remember this apparent conversation. He gave up and shrugged. “Sorry. A lot has happened since then. I don’t quite remember that.”

“Lance, he was your _roommate_!”

Keith had said something similar. But Lance didn’t remember it at _all_! Wasn’t that strange? He poked at the fuzzy feeling, but it engulfed him. No, it wasn’t strange. He was ADHD, remember? If he didn’t know all of the details, that was okay. Maybe Hunk was ADHD, too, or had amnesia! That would make sense. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember.”

Allura shook her head, eyeing him with a small, suspicious frown. “Lance? If Keith does anything strange, will you inform me, please? If he says anything… I don’t know. It won’t sound right to you, maybe conspiracy-like? If he says anything like that, could you come tell me?”

“Sure.”

Allura gave a small nod, still watching him with a perturbed, worried expression on her face. She stared at him for a couple more moments then turned around, clicking back the way she’d come. Lance frowned. Why was everyone so obsessed with Keith?

It was probably just because he was new, Lance decided. Once his roommate had been around for a while, all of this would settle down, back into a nice, comfortable, repetitive routine.

Right?


	12. Chapter 12

Lance was starting to get the impression that his new roommate didn’t like him very much. Keith kept “accidentally” dropping things on his feet or shutting the door on his fingers. He’d even “bumped” into Lance, sending him tripping over a backpack and crashing onto the floor.

Lance frowned at Keith, who was sitting on his bed. “Hunk?” he whispered.

“Yeah?”

“You think maybe… he’s nuts?”

“Maybe,” Hunk said in a hushed voice, “He keeps tripping me. You think he’s just mean?”

Lance frowned, pushing at the fuzziness that seemed to accompany him every time he tried to think about where he’d seen Keith before. “I don’t know. He only does it to us, as far as I can tell, and he always looks at me expectantly, like he’s hoping I’ll do something, and then he just gives this big, disappointed sigh.”

“Weird,” Hunk agreed passively, “Hey, did you do your homework?”

“Of course. Every day, Hunk, you know I’m responsible.”

Keith snorted.

Lance blinked in confusion. “Do you have to blow your nose?” he asked politely.

“You. Responsible. Doing your homework. They _really _did a number on you, didn’t they?”

“What?

Keith frowned. “I don’t know why they put me here,” he said, but it seemed like it was mostly to himself, “Was it just to show me what could happen if they can get their way, or…” He eyed Lance and Hunk like they were some kind of experiment. “Hm…”

Keith opened the window and started to climb out. Lance’s eyes widened in horror. He and Hunk raced to the window and hauled Keith back in. Keith lost balance and fell to the floor.

“Whoa! Hey! You can’t do that! It’s against the rules!”

Keith was too busy curling up into a ball to take notice. “Urgh—ow,” he whimpered.

Lance saw red on Keith’s shirt, and his head started to hurt, like it was trying to retrieve data that had been lost. “Hey, are you okay?”

Keith straightened shakily, hauling himself up. “Fine. I’m fine.” He collapsed on the empty bottom bunk. “Argh… hah… okay. Okay.”

“Should I get the nurse?” Hunk asked timidly.

“Nope. I’m okay.”

“Are you hurt? Should we take you to the doctors?”

“NO!”

Hunk and Lance backed up at Keith’s outburst.

Keith shuddered. “No—don’t take me to the doctors. _Don’t_.”

Lance frowned. The doctors were so nice! But Keith seemed scared of them! Why?! For the first time, Lance noticed tiny burns on Keith’s head, mostly covered by his hair. “Did I see…”

Keith looked at him, a faint hope playing in his eyes. “Yes?”

The image of a device on Keith’s head flashed through Lance’s mind, and he pushed it away. Where was _that _coming from? “Keith? You should tell us if something is wrong. We’re going to be roommates for a year.”

Just like that, Keith sagged, the hope gone, like Lance had reconfirmed something Keith had been hoping wasn’t true. Keith shook his head. “We won’t be roommates for a whole year. I won’t be here long.”

Hunk and Lance glanced at each other warily. This seemed like the kind of thing Mr. Sendak and then Allura had been talking about. “What do you mean?”

Keith shrugged, but he looked worried. “Once I’m healed up… they’re going to take me away. They want me to be in one piece when they…” he gulped. “Never mind.”

“Keith?”

“Nah. You won’t believe me. They’ve vegetablized you, and you never believed me even when they _hadn’t _sucked your soul out.” Keith gave a tired sigh.

Lance’s frown got deeper. “What are you talking about?”

But Keith seemed to be in a different world, now. “They want me to heal before…” he blinked hard. “Wait. If I don’t heal up… That’s it!” Keith pulled his shirt up and ripped at bandages wrapped around his side. Lance yelped, cringing and covering his eyes. Keith had a _gunshot wound_! In his side! Part of Lance wondered how he knew it was a gunshot wound, and the rest was just running around screaming because _ew_!

Lance opened his eyes a little and saw that Keith was tearing at his own wound, ripping it open again. “Argh! Hunk! Stop him! Ohmystars!”

Hunk grabbed Keith’s wrists, stopping him from hurting himself anymore, but the damage was done. The wound was bleeding freely.

“Oh my stars!” Lance yelped, “Oh my stars, oh my stars, oh my stars! He’s bleeding all over the place! Oh my stars! What the _whack_?! He—oh my stars, he reopened his own gunshot wound!”

Keith stopped struggling against Hunk, his struggles getting weaker. “Hah—hah—” he panted, “Hah—see them—can’t—if I’m still—they’ve got to wait.”

“AGH!” Lance screamed, “Hunk, oh my stars, we’ve got to get him to the nurse, or the doctor or something! Can you walk?”

Keith pushed himself up, and promptly fell over. “Nope.” He giggled loopily. “I’m going to need new uniforms if this keeps up. I keep getting bloodstains all over them.”

“Hunk, he’s bleeding out!” Lance grabbed one of Keith’s arms. “Oh my stars. Okay, this is happening. Hunk, help me get him to the nurse!”

Hunk took Keith’s other side, and they hauled him down the hallway, dripping blood on the floor. Keith had passed out in-between them, and they hauled his deadweight to the nurse, who bustled him away, assuring them that she could take care of it.

“This—we should tell Mr. Sendak,” Lance said shakily, “And Allura, she’d want to know, too. You tell Mr. Sendak, I’ll get Allura?”

Hunk nodded and they split up. Lance knocked tentatively on Allura’s door, entering at the faint “come in.”

“Um—Allura?”

She brightened when she saw him. “Lance!”

“Um—you told me—if Keith did anything weird—well—yeah, he did.”

“Oh. Yes. What happened? _Exactly_, Lance. I want the full details, not whatever tidbits Sendak sends me.”

Lance shifted uncomfortably. This seemed suspiciously like a bit of a power struggle between Mr. Sendak and Allura, and he wasn’t sure he wanted any part in it. “He reopened his gunshot wound. _On purpose_.”

Allura frowned. “Do you know why?”

Lance shrugged. “He said—I don’t know, he said something about how he was going to be taken away if he healed, so he wasn’t going to heal.”

Allura nodded thoughtfully. “But where would he be taken…?”

“Maybe to jail?” Lance suggested, “Since he’s a criminal?”

“Maybe…” Allura said slowly. “Hm… is there anything else, Lance?”

Lance shrugged. “Just normal Keith stuff. He didn’t want to see the doctors. He said that they’d ‘vegetablized’ me. Do you know what he meant?”

Allura gave him a careful, measured look. “Lance, before you got… sick… you were much more… energetic, I suppose. Wilder.”

Lance shuddered, trying to imagine that. “It must have been horrible! I don’t know how I could have stood it!”

“Yes.” Allura gave him another analytic look. “Thank you, Lance. For telling me. And if anything else happens…”

“You’ll be the first to know.”

Xxx

Allura clicked on her emails. An email from Sendak, entailing that Keith had ‘managed to reopen his wound’ (although the email did not specify how) and was receiving medical treatment. It didn’t mention anything about what would happen to Keith. More specifically, if he was going somewhere else once he was healed. Nothing about that. Allura frowned.

_Sendak, what are you up to_?


	13. Chapter 13

It was only a day or two before Keith was back in the dorms. This time, his wound had been sealed with a hard plaster that he couldn’t tear through.

“That’s good,” Lance said cheerfully, “You can’t hurt yourself that way!”

Keith responded with a withering glare that suddenly got very sad, and then he went back to his bed, stepping on Lance’s foot on his way. “Do you remember _anything _from before you were sick?” he asked.

Lance frowned, pushing at a fuzzy feeling as his foot throbbed. “Um… I have a lot of siblings… I took the principal’s car out for a joyride… yikes, I really _was _wild, isn’t that weird, Hunk? I can’t imagine doing anything like that _now_!”

“For sure,” Hunk affirmed, “But, like, rules seemed horrible back then, huh? Just now we know they’re there to keep us safe.”

Keith let out a sound that was half a snort, half something Lance was relatively sure was a sob. “They really got you. You two sound like poster children in a ‘say no to drugs’ video.”

Lance felt a small bubble of curiosity rise up in him. Why did Keith keep saying that someone had _got _them? But the pain in his foot disappeared and the fuzzy feeling returned, and Lance pushed the curiosity down. No. Questioning the doctors and Mr. Sendak and the teachers would only bring trouble. And _trouble _was _bad_. No questions. No. Nope. Bad. Not happening.

But the little niggling doubt was there throughout the day, combating a fuzzy feeling. The doubt almost got the upper hand when Keith dropped a physics book on his foot, but the fuzzy feeling returned once Mr. Shiro handed out another worksheet.

Keith folded his sheet over and ripped off the end, making his worksheet a square. Then he folded it into an origami crane.

“Seriously?” Lance whispered sadly, “That’s your _homework_!”

Keith ignored him, folding the strip of paper he’d ripped off into several smaller origami cranes. Lance went back to his own worksheet. Maybe if he _showed_Keith instead of just telling…

Without warning, Keith ripped Lance’s worksheet away, folding it into more cranes.

“Hey!”

“You’re so busy bending over your damn homework, you never look up,” Keith said simply, putting the smaller cranes in his bag, “This stuff will rot your brain, anyway. It’s just to teach you to follow orders.”

Lance frowned, the doubt and the fuzziness fighting again. “And what’s wrong with that?”

Keith shrugged, flapping the wings of one of the bigger cranes. “Nothing, if you never want to see shapes in the clouds.”

Then he picked up the two big cranes and walked out of class.

Ten minutes early.

Xxx

Lance met with Hunk and Katie in the library after school. “English is kicking my _butt_, he complained, “Mr. Coran keeps asking us to ‘imagine’ and ‘create our _own_worlds. I like math and physics better. Just hard facts. No ‘interpretation’ or ‘subjectively finding what the work is saying to you’. Just right or wrong answers.”

“Speaking of Physics…” Hunk handed him the worksheet. “I got a copy made, since Keith ripped yours up.”

Katie frowned. “Why did he do that? Why would he rip up his homework, and yours?”

Lance shrugged. “Something about following orders and looking at the sky. I don’t know. It was too much like one of Coran’s ‘what’s the author’s meaning’ assignments.”

“Oh!” Katie said brightly, “I got a new roommate!”

Hunk grinned. “Oh, yeah! You were by yourself—wasn’t it kind of lonely?”

“Not anymore!” Katie beamed, “Her name is Romelle, and she’s really nice!”

“That’s great,” Hunk told her warmly, “Maybe we can be friends?”

“She’s a little shy,” Katie admitted, “But she’s probably just homesick. You want to meet her now?”

Hunk grinned. “Yeah!”

Lance waved a hand. “I’ve got to do this Physics homework. I’ll catch you later.”

They left, and Lance was alone in the library, crunching numbers in application problems. The only sound was a ticking clock, and then the doors opening and shutting.

“You don’t have your little friend now, do you?”

Lance looked blankly up at the student in front of him. “I’m sorry. Do I know you?”

The other student howled in anger and spilled Lance out of his chair. “_Seriously_?!”

“Hey!” Lance protested, “That’s mean, don’t do that!”

The other student advanced on him, cracking his knuckles. “I’m going to do a whole lot worse!”

Lance scrambled backwards, feeling tears come to his eyes. “Why are you doing this? What did I ever do to you?”

“I don’t know _what _happened to your brain. But I’m going to mess it up _way _worse than whatever this school did to you!”

Keith appeared silently from behind one of the bookshelves, ramming his shoulder into the other student’s gut. “Lance. Go back to the room.”

“Huh?”

Keith hauled him up by his collar and gave him a shove. “Get moving!”

Lance hesitated at the door. “Aren’t you coming?” Maybe Keith was weird, and kind of mean. But this other student looked like he wanted to actually _hurt _someone, and Lance didn’t want there to be any fights.

Keith cracked his knuckles. “I’ve just got to take out the trash.”

Lance bolted, not sure if he was more afraid of the other student, or the scary look in Keith’s eyes. The fuzzy feeling told him everything would be fine, and why was he running in the hallways? He knew that wasn’t allowed!

Lance slowed down and walked the rest of the way to his room, his normal feeling of calm and safety returning. Ugh. Adrenaline was the _worst_.

Lance opened the door and walked into the room. Hunk was still gone, and Lance remembered with a groan that he’d left his homework in the library. He’d have to go back and get it later.

On an impulse, he looked up, and caught his breath. Dangling from the ceiling were dozens of paper cranes, all of them made out of homework sheets. Lance stared at them, wondering how he’d never noticed them. They were all attached to the ceiling with a piece of string that led to a tack, and Lance realized that the tacks made out constellations. A quick glance showed that the big cranes corresponded to the brightest stars in the constellation.

One of the cranes caught Lance’s eye, and he tugged it down, frowning at the date. It was from over a month ago. Keith would have had to folded it, of course, because Lance didn’t have a clue how to fold origami, and he and Hunk always did their homework, anyway.

But Keith hadn’t been here that long!

Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (90% of me: yes, serious, symbolic, very nice. The other 10%: It's an au, I can make the cartoon characters swear 😏)


	14. Chapter 14

The student who had terrorized Lance in the library left the school. Something about “extreme mental trauma” and from what Lance had seen of him, he was a gibbering wreck. Keith refused to tell him anything.

Lance nudged Keith as Mr. Shiro taught about centripetal velocity at the front of the room. “I _know_you did something! This isn’t a coincidence!”

Keith kept his eyes focused on the board, unusual for him. “Remember what killed the cat?”

Lance realized with a start of horror, that he’d been _curious_! No. Bad, bad, bad. Keith was right, for once. He couldn’t be curious. A small part of him wondered if Keith had figured out that he was reporting to Allura. Maybe Keith just didn’t want to get in trouble. Lance wondered if Keith should be punished for fighting if it was to save him.

_Fighting is fighting_, he told himself firmly, and that was that. He didn’t have any proof, so Keith was safe, but if he _did_have proof, then he’d have to turn Keith in.

School passed in a blur, as it always did, the only bumps occurring in English, when Mr. Coran assigned them to draw or write about their idea of a monster before they started on _The Scarlet Letter_. Lance had drawn a vague, lumpy shape with lots of horns and claws and teeth. Coran had clucked his tongue and told Lance to be more imaginative. Hunk and Katie had fared similarly. Lance wondered, vaguely grumpily, if Keith had aced this project.

When the final bell rang, thankfully ending the English torture, and Lance wandered back to his dorm room, shaking off the effects. Mr. Sendak and a crew of his security guards were at the door.

“Um… sir? What’s going on?”

Mr. Sendak spared a glance at him. “Kogane has locked himself inside,” he growled.

“Can I try?”

Sendak gave him a long look, then nodded, stepping back. Lance knocked on the door.

“Keith? It’s me.”

There was a heavy pause, and then the door opened just a crack. Keith pushed it open, grabbed Lance by the collar, dragged him in and quickly slammed it shut again before Sendak could react.

“Whoa!”

Keith was breathing heavily, his face pale with fear. “They’re coming for me,” he whispered, “They’re going to take me away.”

Lance’s mind struggled to comprehend this. “Take you away? Like… graduate?” That didn’t seem quite fair. Lance had been working hard to be a model student, and _Keith_was going to graduate first? The guy made origami out of his homework, for stars’ sake!

Keith laughed hysterically, running his fingers through his bangs. “You don’t get it, Lance. Where they’re taking me? I’m not ever coming back.”

Lance shook his head slightly. “You’re overreacting. They’re not going to kill you.”

Keith gave another hysterical laugh. “No, you’re right, they’re not. It would be a lot simpler if they were.”

“Keith?”

Keith shook him by the shoulders. “_Please_. Just _try_to remember! Just _try_! Do you remember the L wing?”

Lance’s head started to hurt, and the fuzziness started to come. There _should_be something to remember. Allura said they’d been roommates. The origami crane from months ago. He _should_have some memory of Keith, even just a little one. What was _wrong_with him?! Why couldn’t he remember?! The L wing—it sounded _so familiar_!

The fuzzy feeling blanketed him, pressing firmly against these thoughts. No. He _didn’t know Keith before_.

As if in a trance, Lance reached for the door handle.

“Lance—no, Lance, don’t—you don’t understand, Lance, I _can’t_let them take me away, I—”

With a click, Lance unlocked the door and opened it.

Mr. Sendak shoved the door open all of the way before Keith could get to it, and he grabbed for Keith’s arm. Keith shot away, grabbing Lance in a headlock and backing towards the window, which was locked.

A single jab with Keith’s knife broke through the window, making a hole big enough for a human to fit through.

“Not any closer!” Keith yelled, “One step closer, and I’ll go out the window! And I’ll take Lance with me! You might be fine letting _me_die, but are you willing to let _both_of us die?!”

Lance’s heart started to beat faster in his chest. Was Keith_insane_?!

Sendak laughed. “You won’t. The fall might not kill you. It’s only a second story window: there’s a good chance you’ll just break a bunch of bones.”

Keith dragged Lance even closer to the window, Keith’s back pressed against the glass. “I’ll do it!”

“No, you won’t. You haven’t been spending all of this time trying to snap McClain out of the brainwashing just to throw him out of a window _now_.”

Keith wavered. Lance frowned. Brainwashing?

“Oh, did you think we didn’t know what all of those doors on his fingers and books on his feet were an attempt to do? Or did you think that we wouldn’t say it in front of him? It doesn’t matter if we do. We can just reprogram him, if he even remembers this afterwards anyway.” Sendak leveled something at them. “Let him go and step away from the window.”

Keith started to press even harder out the window, ready to fall, and to take Lance down with him.

Sendak leapt forward, brandishing his Taser. Keith yelped, instinctively ducking behind Lance. Lance got the full force of the electricity, jolting him, _hard_. Everything went numb as he dropped to the floor.

_What…?_

_Why…_?

The last thing he heard was a shout of triumph from Sendak.


	15. Chapter 15

Lance blinked up at the ceiling and all of the paper cranes dangling from it. What was he doing on the floor? And why did he feel like a potato that had been put through a microwave?

It all came back to him in a rush. Keith. Sendak. The taser.

_They’ve taken Keith to the L wing_.

Lance shuddered, thinking of the last few weeks. Ew. Ew. _Gross_. He’d been a little _rule follower_. Whatever had happened to Katie had happened to him, and to Hunk. The taser must have been the only sharp enough shock to snap him out of it. Keith had been trying to break him out of it by shutting his fingers in the doors, but it hadn’t been enough.

Keith. Lance shuddered. He knew how _he’d _feel if everyone around him was turned into a zombie. Keith had been upset enough when Shiro had been brainwashed. But _every single person he knew _turning into some kind of zombie that just… yikes.

_Keith._

_L wing._

_Focus_.

Lance finally got up, glancing at the clock. Okay. About an hour since he’d passed out. Not too long. Hopefully. Right. L wing. Ceiling probably wasn’t an option anymore. Lance frowned. He knew how to break the brainwashing. But… where was he supposed to get a taser?

_Focus. Get rid of brainwashing later. Jailbreak now_.

Lance ran out, half-sprinting, half-sliding down the hallway towards Allura’s office. He ran into a girl with violet eyes and blonde hair. Pidge’s new roommate. Romelle. He grabbed her by the shoulders. “If Katie and Hunk ask where I am, tell them I’m suffering a relapse of sickness. Don’t tell them I went to see Allura. Don’t tell _anyone _that I went to see Allura, or even that you saw me at all. And if you can get out of here, do it. Don’t stay in this school. Run as far away as you can.”

She blinked at him, her face scared, although Lance suspected she thought he was crazy and was scared of _him_, not of what he’d said. “O-kay?”

Lance nodded, released her, and ran into Allura’s office.

“Allura!”

She looked up, surprised. “Lance?!”

Lance skidded to a halt in front of her desk, slamming hands down on it. “Allura, I’m going to sound crazy. Absolutely _nuts_. Okay? Promise I’m not crazy. This is really happening.”

“Lance, you’re acting… different. Than the last few weeks. But more like yourself before you got sick.”

“Yeah. About that. So. Um. I really need your help. Keith’s in danger. I—yikes, this sounds _really _crazy, but I was under… not mind-control, brainwashing, I guess? Anyway, so that’s why I’ve been acting weird, and now they’ve kidnapped Keith, and I don’t even know _where _to start, I’m realizing just now that _he’s _normally the one that makes the whacky infiltration plans, and my entire plan revolved around getting you to believe me, so now what, I don’t know, I guess you take the lead?”

Allura held her hands up. “Lance. Slow down. You were brainwashed? That’s why you were acting… strangely?”

Lance bobbed his head up and down frantically. “I’m not crazy,” he promised, “I’m really not, this happened, in—”

“Lance. Why don’t we stick to yes or no? It’ll be faster.”

Lance nodded. “Okay.”

“You were brainwashed. Okay. This happened, where, in the L wing?”

“Yes.”

“Keith has been kidnapped.”

“Yes.”

“Is that where Lotor disappeared to? Sendak said that he graduated, but I _know_that he wanted to finish out the year.”

“Yes.”

Allura hesitated. “And… other students? Does no one really graduate?”

“Some do,” Lance said dully, “But they graduate as zombies. Allura, they’ve had Keith for an hour, at least, can we answer all the questions later? He can probably explain it better anyway, he probably has a whole powerpoint on the situation.”

Allura nodded crisply, pushing back from her desk and getting up. “Alright. L wing it is. One more question—Keith attempted to murder the principal. Why? I need to know—we’ll rescue him, but do I need to be watching my back while I’m around him?”

“No. No, no, no. No, Keith—the principal was behind all of this. Keith thought—he thought maybe all of the kidnapping would end if the principal was dead?”

“Why didn’t he come to me? Or call the police?”

“He wasn’t sure who he could trust,” Lance said simply, turning to leave.

Allura’s eyes misted over as she followed Lance out the door. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

“For what? _You’re _helping _me_.”

“For trusting me.”

Allura strode easily through the hallways. Lance thought he saw a pair of feminine violet eyes watching them, but they were gone when he took a second look. Allura put her hands on the handles of the L wing and opened the door.

“Coming?”

Lance shuddered. The last time he’d been down here, he’d been strapped to a chair and had been turned into a vegetable. But he plunged after Allura.

“What are they doing to the students who disappear?” Allura whispered.

“You won’t believe me.”

“Tell me.”

“Well—”

Allura peered in a window and screamed, staggering back.

“That,” Lance finished. It was Florona and Plaxum, still swimming in their fishtank.

“Oh my—” Allura gasped, hyperventilating. “Oh, my—you said brainwashing, and I thought that was strange but—oh dear. Oh, dear. Oooooookay. This is happening. This is really, truly happening. Okay. Once we get Keith out of here, I am _calling the police_.”

“Wait! Allura, the police mostly suggested we come here. What if…”

Allura’s eyes widened, and she put a hand to her mouth. “You think they’re in on it? I’m starting to see how Keith felt! But—hang on, I went to school here! I wasn’t brainwashed!” She frowned. “I think.”

“Well—” Lance started peering in windows, looking for Keith, Allura following behind him. “You said the L wing got burned in your freshman year, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that might have been a front to clear out the area. And it would’ve taken awhile to build all of this, especially if they had to do it secretly. So maybe they just didn’t get a chance.”

“Lance. Lance, Lance, Lance.” Allura grabbed his arm. “_Lance_.”

“Ow, you have a strong grip. What is it?” Lance looked towards her and followed her gaze to one purple boy with white hair and glowing yellow eyes who was staring at them. “Oh.”

“That’s—oh—Lance—”

Lance gently pulled her away. “Allura. We’ll come back for him. We _will_. But… we can’t help him now, Allura, I’m sorry. It’s already done.”

She nodded, wiping a tear away. “Right. Right, okay. We’ll come back for him. Keith—we can still save Keith. Okay.”

Lance peered through another window. “Found him!”

Keith was shackled to a chair, that same crown-like machine on his head as before, dressed in what looked like hospital linens. Lance shuddered. That was what Lotor was wearing, too. “Okay.” He opened the door, peeking around for one of the doctors or for Sendak. “Keith?”

Keith’s eyes were closed, his breathing shallow. Lance pulled the crown off, and Allura followed him in, wincing. “Look at his hands and feet! Why would they do this?!”

Lance looked down and saw that the shackles were so tight that Keith’s fingers were turning blue, his toes were a similar color. “How do we get them off? Keith? Hey, wake up.” Lance shook Keith’s shoulder, and his purple eyes opened a crack.

“You still a vegetable?” he croaked.

Lance almost cracked a grin. “Nope. Fully made of meat, promise. Hey, how do we get these off?”

Keith frowned. “Hnm. Uh. Think there’s a key. _Stars_…” His head slumped forward. “_Ow_. Everything… ugh. Can’t feel my feet or hands.”

“Yeah… Hey, stick with us, no passing out. Where’s the key?”

“Ungh—Doctors had it? I don’t know.”

Allura spotted it first, hanging on the wall. “Got it.” She unlocked the shackles and Keith pitched forward. Lance pushed him back. “Hey! Whoa! Can you stand?”

Keith made a valiant effort, but he most definitely could not. Lance didn’t know if it was from the aftereffects of the crown-thing, or because of his feet. Probably a bit of both. Allura took one of Keith’s arms, and Lance took the other, and between the two of them, they managed to half-carry, half-drag Keith out into the hallway, his head flopping listlessly as he gave up and passed out again. A doctor carrying a blood bag spotted them.

“Hey!”

“Run!” Lance yelped, and they sure tried, half-stumbling away. They hit a door, and Lance pushed it open, slamming and locking it behind them and prying open a window. “Go, go, go!”

“We’ll fall!”

“There’s a bit of roof from the first story underneath this window, we can do it. You first, and I’ll push Keith out after you.”

Keith opened one eye to glare at him. “I cn do it,” he mumbled, hauling himself out the window after Allura. Lance still gave him a push, anxious to get out as something big pounded on the door.

Then he was out and closing the window behind them. Allura was already on the ground, wincing and shaking her feet. She must have jumped. Keith was next, stumbling and falling when he landed. Lance shook himself. “Okay. Ooookay. This is fine. Just like jumping out of a swing.”

“Hurry up!” Allura called. 

Lance jumped, staggering as he landed, shoots of pain going up his ankle. “Ah! That hurt a lot more than jumping out of a swing!”

“Let’s _go_!” Allura demanded, hauling Keith back up and running for it. Lance followed her, and they made it to the trees. Keith’s chin had sagged down to his chest, but he looked up blearily. “That way,” he murmured, and they found a hole in the fence. Allura looked scandalized, but she didn’t say a word as they limped away. They walked for about thirty minutes and then stopped.

“We’ll… be… okay,” Allura panted, “Far—enough.”

Keith was unconscious, so they set him down and retreated away. Allura ran a hand through her hair. “Oh. Oh! I can’t believe—Oh, my, I haven’t done anything like this in _such _a long time!” She gave a short laugh. “Hah—not since before I came here! Goodness!”

“What?”

“I…” Allura blushed, looking at the ground. “I was a klepto. That’s why I was sent here. I used to do a lot of running, under a lot of pressure.”

Lance slid down a tree, the adrenaline fading. “Okay. Okay, what do we do now?”

Allura shrugged uneasily. “We have to come up with a new plan, I suppose. But first, we need to take care of Keith.”

Keith seemed to only be vaguely aware of his surroundings, and he struggled slightly when Allura took his arm, examining his wrist and hand. She hissed in. “Your wrist…” The shackles had cut into him, leaving sores and bleeding cuts all over his wrist. And his hands were now a red color, which Lance supposed was better than blue.

“Why…?”

“I kept fighting it,” Keith mumbled, pulling away. He cradled his wrists near his chest. “’m fine.”

“Keith? I want to take a look at your ankles, okay?”

Keith shrank away. “I told you, ‘m fine.” He leaned against a tree, his eyes closed. “’m just tired.”

Allura tried again. “Keith, I won’t hurt you. I promise. I just want to help you—it’s not healthy for your blood circulation to be cut off, and you couldn’t even walk.”

Keith didn’t respond, his eyes still closed, and Allura took that as in invitation to scoot closer, taking his arm again and picking up his hand, bending his wrist. “Okay?”

Keith eyed her. “Fine.”

She bent one of his fingers, and he yelped, snatching his hand away. “You said you wouldn’t hurt me,” he accused, and then turned red with embarrassment.

Allura raised her hands in surrender. “I’m sorry. But that’s… that’s not good. Keith. You need to take it easy, okay? Losing blood circulation in any part of your body isn’t a joke.”

He closed his eyes again. “Okay.”

“I’m going to wrap your wrists and ankles up, okay? It won’t be too tight. I just don’t want anything to get into those cuts and sores.”

Keith gave a short nod, and Allura ripped the end of her skirt, making makeshift bandages. She wrapped Keith up and then dropped back next to Lance.

“Now what?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. We’ve got to rescue the others, somehow, but we can’t go to the police. Mr. Shiro got brainwashed too, when Keith asked him to investigate.”

Allura’s eyes widened in horror. “They’re doing it to the _teachers_, too?!”

“Just Shiro. I guess he found out what was happening.”

Allura’s head thudded against a tree. “Stars. Who can we trust?”

Lance frowned, biting his lip thoughtfully. “Mr. Coran,” he said finally, “He was always encouraging us to use our imaginations and think outside of the box, which is the exact _opposite _of what Zarkon wants.”

“Why is he doing this? Why is he…” Allura buried her head in her arms. “They were so young,” she whispered, “Lotor, and Florona and Plaxum.”

“And Nyma,” Lance said dully, “I never saw her. Which means…”

Allura gulped. “Do you think that she died?”

“Maybe.”

“We—we need a plan. We saved Keith, but he’s in no shape to do anything. We’re far out, so we can’t get to civilization in any reasonable amount of time. What do we do now?”

“Keith had the right idea. We need to stop Zarkon.”

Allura stared at him. “You mean—kill him?!”

“If that’s what it takes,” Lance said grimly.

“I—I don’t think I could. End someone’s life, I mean. Do you?”

Lance hesitated. “No,” he admitted.

“So, what, we just wait for Keith to get better, hand him a knife and say ‘go’?”

Lance looked back at Keith. He was asleep, curled into a ball and shivering. “Is… Is he _going _to get better?”

Allura nodded, but she looked uncertain. “He should recover. Given time.”

“We don’t _have _time! Every second is a student brainwashed or experimented on!”

“Well, what are we supposed to _do_?!”

“We need—” Lance paused. “Do you hear something?”

Allura frowned. “Like… something rustling in the bushes?”

“Yes…”

“Could be an animal,” Allura said hopefully.

The rustling got closer, and then Romelle emerged, holding blankets. “Um—I’m sorry, I watched you go, and I found the hole. I thought it might be kind of cold? I don’t know what’s going on, but…” She shivered. “I don’t know, the school feels kind of… wrong, I guess. What’s going on? Can I help?”

Allura and Lance glanced at each other. They had an ally in the building.

It wasn’t much.

But it was a start.


	16. Planning

Lance snuck towards the school fenceline, searching for any sign of Romelle. He didn’t see her, but there _was_a piece of paper, and a small cloth bundle.

_Allura and Lance:_

_They’re putting more patrols out at night. They told us that you two were trying to steal something from the school. Didn’t manage to get any tasers, sorry. They’re watching everything super close. I got a change of clothes for you guys, though_.

Lance nodded, grabbing the bundle and making his way back to camp. His uniform didn’t allow much in the way of movement, and the same held true for Allura’s skirt. Romelle’s change seemed to be all black though. What was this, a spy movie?

Keith was asleep when Lance got back, but he woke up the instant Lance got close to camp, like some kind of human alarm system. “You’re back.”

Lance hadn’t thought Keith had even been aware that he’d _left_. “Yep, that’s me. Romelle says Merry Christmas.” He threw Keith the bundle. “Where’s Allura?”

“Out looking for food.”

“Yeeeeaaaah, good luck with that.”

Keith shrugged. “I doubt she can hunt, and she’ll probably pick up nightshade berries and think they’re blueberries.”

“How do your hands and feet feel?”

“Like they’re going to fall off,” Keith said matter-of-factly.

“Walking?”

Keith shook his head. “Not great.” He glared at the ground. “Stupid doctors.”

“Um… what exactly…”

Keith shrugged. “I think they were trying to turn me into a brainwashed zombie like you before they messed with my body structure.”

“Yeah? How was that working out for them?”

A small smile crossed Keith’s face. “Not well.”

“So, what, they figured they’d let you heal up first?”

Keith shrugged. “I guess. They let me go, but you guys…” He shook his head. “It was too late. I just…” he shuddered. “It was awful. So… you. You’re not brainwashed anymore. How?”

“I got tased.”

“That’s all it took?!”

“What do you mean, _all_?! It _hurt_!”

Keith raised an eyebrow. “I got _shot_. Forgive me for not having sympathy for you getting a little taser zap.”

Lance crossed his arms and sat down, fuming. “Whatever. It’s your own stupid fault you got shot anyway. Speaking of which, why did you stick around? After you were shot, why did you go back to school?! You had to know that they were going to catch you!”

“I wanted another shot at the principal,” Keith said quietly, “I failed the first time, but I hoped to get him the second.”

“And did you? No. No, you did not.”

“I got him in the arm. I was _so close_, Lance, I _almost ended this_.”

“And in the meantime, I got turned into a zombie and now we’re all fugitives. Thanks, Keith.”

“Look, I didn’t tell them _anything_. They kept asking me who helped me, and I never snitched on you. I don’t know _how _they caught you, but it wasn’t my fault.”

Lance turned red. “Yeah. I know it wasn’t your fault.”

Keith blinked. “Oh. Do you know whose fault it was?”

Lance’s entire face was scarlet now. “Yeah.”

“Really?”

“Itwasmine,” Lance muttered under his breath.

“What was that?”

“It was _my _stupid fault, okay?! They called me in because they thought I might know who helped you, and I thought they called me in because you snitched, so I blabbed my stupid mouth off trying to save my own skin, okay?!”

Keith stared at him for a second. Then he started to laugh.

“Shut up,” Lance grumbled, “It’s not funny.”

“Yes—it—is!”

“Shut _up_! It’s _not_!”

“I thought—” Keith laughed even harder. “I thought—that maybe—I’d said something without knowing it—or maybe—there was a traitor—and this whole time—the problem—was that you ran your stupid mouth off!” He was doubled over, he was laughing so hard.

Lance’s face felt hot enough to cook a pancake on. “It’s not _that _funny,” he fumed. But Keith’s humor kind of seemed relieved, like he’d been really worried about the cause of Lance’s capture and was senselessly glad that it was an incredibly stupid reason.

“Look, let’s just move on with life. Allura and I were thinking that we could free Hunk and Pidge and Shiro and then move on from there.”

Keith shut up, serious again. “No. We need to go right to Zarkon. Get him first.”

“Keith, there’s, like, three of us. We need to have more allies before we go wage a war on him.”

“There’s only one of him. We don’t have tasers, so we don’t have a surefire way to free them. And assuming we manage free the others, he’ll get wise to what we’re doing. Right now, the sensible thing for us to have done is run away and never looked back. Go get plastic surgery, a new ID and gone to Mexico.”

“Yeah, but we didn’t.”

“Right. But as far as anyone knows, that’s what we’ll be doing. Because it’s the smartest, most selfish thing to do. And we’re a bunch of smart, selfish criminals. So if we attack Zarkon first, he won’t know what hit him. He won’t have any time to prepare, because he thinks we’re running to Mexico.”

“Hang on, though, first I blabbed everything and then the instant I was out of brainwashing, I went and rescued you. They know by now that I’m neither smart nor selfish.”

“Okay. Granted. However. What do you think their impression of _me _is?

Lance thought about it. Keith had left him and Hunk to face the fire when he’d set off the L wing alarms. “Smart and selfish?”

“Right. And?”

“Very violent and dangerous?”

“Exactly. They’ll think that I’ve made you come along to Mexico, because I’m a smart, ruthless, selfish criminal. Point being, we’ll help Shiro and the others _after_we’ve finished this fight.”

“No.”

Lance twisted his neck to see Allura, her arms crossed.

Keith’s eyebrows drew together in a stormy ‘v’. “No?”

“No. They’ve been left under Zarkon’s thumb long enough. We’re freeing the brainwashed kids and the ones in the L wing _first_.”

“We can’t free Florona and Plaxum,” Lance offered, “They might need water to survive.”

“Fine. But we’re freeing Lotor. And Nyma, if we can find her. And anyone else in that godforsaken hallway.”

Keith growled. “No! We can’t do both!”

“Wait, hang on,” Lance interjected, “Shiro.”

“What about Shiro?”

“Shiro didn’t just go zombie like Hunk and Pidge and I. He was _hostile_. Keith, with Shiro, it might be a matter of having another enemy instead of having a bunch of brainwashed kids who can be put off for later.”

Keith tapped his foot. “Rgh—fine. Fine, fine, fine. We’ll be a bunch of softies. Going directly for Zarkon would have been the best plan, but—”

“Hey!” Romelle jogged in, holding three tasers. “I got them! I owe a klepto a favor, but I got them. The guards have been watching me, though…”

Keith’s eyes lit up like it was Christmas. “Okay. Alright.”

Lance bit his lip, nervous at what his friend might be planning. “Um. Keith?”

“Romelle?”

“Y-yes?” 

“Can you get Pidge and Hunk into one place?”

“Yeeeeees?”

“Yes or no, Romelle, can you?”

“Yeah. I can do that.”

“Okay. Do you know how to operate a taser?”

“No! Why would I?!”

“Right, okay, we can fix that. I’m going to teach you how to use this thing, okay, and then you’re going to take it back, lure Hunk and Pidge somewhere private, and use it on them.”

“It won’t hurt them too badly, will it?”

“No.”

Lance snorted. It had hurt a _lot_, thanks, Keith, but it needed to be done. He knew that.

Keith nodded to himself. “Okay. Okay, so Romelle can get the two of them. Allura, you can free the L wing prisoners. You don’t need a taser, just let them out, okay? Be careful, though. They’ve been down there a long time, and they might not react exactly like humans. Lance, you make straight for Zarkon’s office with another taser. The biggest thing I need you to do is to get in and take care of Sendak if he shows up. Zap Zarkon if you can, but if you can’t, I’ll take care of it.”

“Um, Keith? I’m sorry, but what about Shiro? If he shows up, he can probably take me out. So can Sendak, come to think of it, but if I take him by surprise it’ll be fine. But if Sendak _and_Shiro show up it might be a problem.”

Keith nodded. “I can take care of Shiro.”

“Are you sure? You’re still kind of injured, and I know he’s your friend, so—”

Keith grabbed the last taser. “I can handle it. Just do your part, and we can end all of this in one blow.”


	17. Plans Don't Always Go as… Planned.

Lance glanced at his watch as he crept towards the school. Three… two… one… time to go. He bolted for the kitchen door and snuck through. True to her word, Romelle had managed to get it unlocked. Allura followed behind him. Keith, of course, had opted to use a window, since it was a faster and less populated route.

“Good luck,” Allura whispered, and she turned off towards the L wing. Classes were in session right now, so the only people that would be in the hallways would be the guards. Which were, of course, the ones they really had to worry about.

Xxx

Allura opened the door to the L wing soundlessly, grateful that they hadn’t had the time to take her handprint off of the alarm system on the door. She tapped by Florona and Plaxum’s fishtank, making straight for Lotor’s prison. She pulled out a screwdriver (provided by Romelle, of course) and attacked the hinges of the door, unscrewing them and taking the door clear off.

“Lotor?”

“Allura?”

Allura dropped to her knees next to him. “Oh, Lotor. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry! I should have figured it out—I should have tried harder to find you when you disappeared even after they told me that you graduated!”

“Allura.” Lotor leaned against her, his shoulders shaking. “Allura, he’s my _father_! How could he—he—”

Allura hugged him. He’d been at the school the longest, and as the student council president, she’d worked with him more closely than any of the other students. She’d been there when his mother had died in a car wreck and his father had been badly injured. She’d been there when all of his friends had ‘graduated’ and he’d been left behind. And now she had to be here for this.

“I’m sorry, Lotor.” She pulled back. “We need to get out of here.”

“And go _where_? I’m_purple_, Allura! I can’t go anywhere that I will fit in.”

“Lotor, we’ll figure it out. But right now, we’re going to get you and everyone else out of here.” Allura picked the lock on his chains and offered him a hand up, wincing as she hauled him to his feet. Lotor had never exactly been heavy, but he barely weighed _anything _now. Allura’s vision went red. It wasn’t enough that they’d experimented on them. They had to _starve _him, too?!

Lotor closed his glowing eyes. “There _is _no one else. Except for the fish-girls, but we can’t take them out.”

“Nyma?”

“Dead in experimentation. Just like Narti, and Axca and Zethrid and Ezor when _they_‘ graduated.’” Lotor’s voice cracked.

Allura’s heart clenched. She’d hoped that maybe Lotor’s friends had been released into the world. They could get them back that way, at least.

“Okay. Alright. Let’s just get you out of here, for now. We’re going to end this, Lotor. Lance and Keith and Romelle and I. We’re finishing it. This won’t happen to _anyone _else.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” a deep voice rumbled from the door.

Xxx

Romelle smiled brightly at Hunk and Katie. “I’ve got something I want to show you! In the library! Come on!”

They looked up at her. “What is it? A book?”

Romelle laughed. “No, sillies! It’s a piece of art I drew! Mr. Coran said it was the best in the class! We put it up in the library so that _everyone _could see it! Come on!”

Hunk and Katie looked at each other, shrugged, and followed her to the library. Romelle fingered the taser in her pocket, her mouth dry. This was it. She was going to free them. She’d never known the real Hunk and Katie. But she wanted to. And now was her chance.

Xxx

Keith levered open Shiro’s office window and wriggled in silently. Shiro didn’t have a class right now, so it was the perfect time to strike. He primed the taser, and the crackling noise made Shiro turn around.

“Keith?”

Keith circled around Shiro, cutting him off from the door and from the page button.

Shiro’s face broke out into a nervous smile. “Keith! Thank the stars, you’re okay—Keith, I felt so horrible, tricking you and saying those things to you—I’m sorry, Keith, but I was worried that if it looked like I was telling you everything they’d go after you.”

Keith faltered, the taser wavering slightly. “W-What?”

“I went to the L wing, Keith. I saw everything inside. And Sendak caught me. Told me that if I told anyone about what I’d seen, they’d kill them and then me. They can get away with that. They tell the parents of the kids who don’t come out that the kid ran away. And I was so worried that they’d kill you! So I had to scare you off, and act like a regular teacher. I’m so sorry that I hurt you, Keith.”

Keith let his arm drop, the taser by his side. Shiro was okay. He'd been trying to protect Keith. “Shiro? I—” his eyes filled with tears. “It’s been—bad. Really bad. I—” Suddenly, in the solid, kind, protective presence of Shiro, it hit Keith that over the last month he’d been shot, electrocuted, seen everyone around him turn into zombies, torn open his own wound, been electrocuted more and nearly lost his hands and feet. His legs wobbled and went out, the taser clattering to the floor. “Shiro,” he whispered. Shiro could fix this.

Shiro walked towards him, kicking the taser safely away. “Oh, Keith,” he said quietly, kneeling down next to him, “For a hardened criminal… you really are too easy.” He grabbed Keith by the back of the shirt and threw him into the desk. Gone in an instant was the kind, worried, apologetic Shiro. In his place was a cold hard machine.

Keith struggled to stand, his head throbbing from where it had hit the desk. “Wh-wha—”

“I don’t care about you, Keith. I care about helping the principal. You should have just run and forgotten about me. That’s what we all expected you to do. But I guess there’s a heart in there after all.”

Shiro kicked Keith in the stomach, shoving him over. Keith gasped for breath, curling up instinctively.

“Shi-ro—”

“Shut _up_!”

Shiro punched Keith in the mouth, and his lip slit, blood coating his mouth. And Keith snapped. He lunged forward, ramming his shoulder into Shiro’s stomach. He threw a punch that was easily blocked, and then aimed a kick right at Shiro’s kneecap.

Shiro laughed breathlessly. “_There _we go! I was so disappointed! I heard you were such a violent criminal, a long history of putting people in the hospital, and then you weren’t so bad when I met you! But here’s what I was hearing about, the violent, rage-filled creature!”

Keith channeled his rage. He didn’t want to hurt Shiro. But he needed to get that taser, and Shiro was not letting him at it. He aimed another punch at Shiro’s face. Shiro caught the fist and twisted. Sharp shocks of pain ran up Keith’s arm, and he yelped.

Shiro whirled him around into the wall. Keith hit the ground, gasping. _Ow_. His right arm had gone numb, and his legs felt like they were made of lead.

_Can’t stop now_.

Keith spotted the taser where it had been kicked and made a run for it, going low and trying to make himself as little of a target as possible. It didn’t work. Shiro swept his legs out from underneath him. Keith crawled towards the still-armed taser, but Shiro lifted him up by the throat, squeezing and cutting off Keith’s air supply.

Keith gasped, choking and flailing, but Shiro had a strong grip. His vision started to go black, his kicking becoming weaker by the second. Too late, his foot found the taser, like a mockery of how close he’d gotten.

_I’m sorry…_

_I… failed._

Xxx

Lance’s heart fed a steady tempo as he rounded corners, on the lookout for Sendak. Allura should be freeing the L wing prisoners about now. Romelle should have managed to snap Pidge and Hunk out of it. Keith and Shiro were probably on their way. It was all up to him.

Lance pushed open the door to the principal’s office, nearly tripping over some kind of line. He could hear a rasping noise and a beeping noise, and he froze, hoping that the principal was asleep. When nothing happened, he started feeling all over the wall for the lightswitch. There were cords everywhere, combining with the dark and making it difficult to locate the switch. Lance’s fumbling hand finally found the lightswitch, and he flipped it up, wincing as the bright light flooded his eyes.

Then his eyes shot wide open. Keith had never told him anything about his visit to the principal. And right now, Lance really, _really _wished that he had told him what to expect.

“What the _hell_?” he whispered softly.


	18. Chapter 18

Lance stared at the chair in front of him. He wasn’t even sure who was in it. Medical tubes and lines fed all over into the principal. Machines showed vitals, contributing to the beeping noise that he’d heard. And the rasping was breathing, almost artificial breathing, with oxygen lines going into the nose of the principal. One bandage was wrapped around the principal’s upper arm, probably from where Keith had tried to stab him. Suddenly, the fact that Keith _hadn’t _managed to kill the principal seemed preposterous. Seriously? How had he _missed_?! It wasn’t like the guy could move and dodge!

Principal Zarkon gave a dry chuckle. “You weren’t expecting _this_, were you?”

Suddenly it all made sense. _“Zap Zarkon if you can, but if you can’t, I’ll take care of it._” Keth had known. He’d known what a pitiful state the principal was in, and that Lance _might _have a bit of a moral dilemma about hitting him with a taser. It might _kill _him, for stars’ sake.

Of course, that was what Keith was planning, wasn’t it? He was planning to destroy this sad, pathetic creature. The idea suddenly seemed a lot less appealing.

“Wh-Wha?” _Oh, way to go, Lance. Can you form coherent sentences, please_?

“I was in a car wreck. A wreck that killed my dear wife and left me like this, barely able to live. If you can call this ‘living.’”

“But—the experiments? Why?” _Better_.

Zarkon chuckled. “The fantasy of an old, rich man. A fantasy that, might I add, seems to be about to pay off.” He coughed as there was a knock on the door. “Ah. Hold a moment.” He pressed a button, and the door buzzed. Sendak entered, holding a twisting, flailing Allura by the arms.

“Allura!” Lance primed his taser and leapt at Sendak, but the big man swatted him to the side easily, sending him into a wall. Lance blinked back stars as Sendak tied Allura to a chair and then hauled Lance up, securing him next to her. Then he picked the taser up, deactivating it and clipping it to his belt.

Zarkon yawned. “Any more interruptions?”

The door burst open again, and Shiro strode through. Lance’s heart swelled with hope, until Shiro threw and unconscious Keith to the floor. “He tried to attack me, as predicted.” Shiro explained emotionlessly, “As you suggested, he had a taser. He was easy to subdue.”

“Ah. That’s all of them, then?”

Sendak glowered at the floor, and for the first time, Lance noticed a bloody gouge over his eye. “One of the experiments is loose in the school.”

“_What_?! How could you let one escape?!”

“I wasn’t exactly _planning on it_, but a certain _ex-dean _let him out! Don’t worry. I’ve got men on it.”

Zarkon rolled his eyes towards heaven. “The same men that failed to apprehend a _shot teenager _until he came _waltzing into my office _to try and _kill me _for a _second time_?”

Sendak paused. “They won’t fail this time. The experiment is the only possible disturbance.”

Hope started to grow again. They didn’t know about Romelle! She was still out there, and by now, she’d probably freed Hunk and Pidge and explained everything to them! There was still a chance.

A little more worrying was Keith. He hadn’t moved. At _all_. And his lip was busted wide open. Had Shiro killed him on accident? No—he was still breathing. But how badly had he been hit?! Lance shuddered. Sometimes he forgot that his nice Physics teacher was an air force veteran.

Zarkon smiled indulgently at Lance. “I’ve seen your biology grades on your transcript, and they were abysmal, but tell me, what do you know about the starfish?”

Half of Lance brain yelled frantically at him that this was some kind of trick, while the other half yelled “pop quiz!”

“Um—They live in the ocean? They’re scavengers, right?”

“They regenerate limbs that have been lost,” Zarkon growled, “You asked why I would do these experiments. The answer is simple: to learn how to integrate genetics with my own so that I could gain the regenerative abilities of a starfish.”

“Ah, yes, simple,” Lance muttered to himself, “Should have figured it out, really. All very obvious, comes right to the mind.”

“It sounds like science fiction. A thing of the future. But I’ve made it part of today. The serum that will make me whole will have finally finished today—these things take time, you know. I didn’t just integrate DNA wily-nily. But I’ll have it. I’ll be back to my normal life again.”

“So… you’re going to stop?” Lance asked hopefully.

Zarkon laughed. “Why would I do that? Lotor was the first step in the next direction, Integrating cat DNA. I can make superhumans. Superhumans that other humans might like to have access to.”

Lance’s jaw dropped in horror. “You were going to _sell them_?!”

“Think about Plaxum and Florona. Give them an underwater bomb, they could swim in, plant it and swim out without ever being detected as more than a fish.”

“That’s so… _wrong_!”

“Your friend here was going to be an even bigger step. Multiple sets of DNA. Bird, to make an air creature, as well as the starfish to make him a fast regenerator.”

Over in the window, Pidge’s head popped up. She gave Lance a wink, then ducked back low. Lance barely kept a grin off of his face. Romelle had done it!

Allura shook her head. “But even if you managed to graft wings on him, he still wouldn’t be a bird! The wingspan would have to be _huge _to support his weight, because he doesn’t have the bone structure—”

“DNA integration is only one step,” Zarkon interrupted, “With Lotor, the genes expressed themselves quickly—cats and humans _are_both mammals after all, and the genes used were only a step or two off of human genes. Florona and Plaxum took time to change. However with our young, unconscious friend, here… My dear, you mentioned grafting wings, on, correct? That would only be the first step. I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.”

Lance gulped. They wanted to tear Keith apart. No _wonder _they’d wanted his gunshot wound to heal first, and no _wonder _they’d wanted him to be a brainwashed zombie first! Lance glanced at Keith. No reaction. He was still out cold.

“Why are you telling us this?!” Allura demanded, straining against her bonds. Pidge’s head popped up in the window again, and Lance lifted his chin towards her. _On three_, he mouthed, _Three… two…_

Zarkon yawned. “I don’t see that it matters. You won’t remember it. And I thought I’d rather like to tell _someone_.”

“One!” Lance yelled.

Sendak gave him a smugly-confused look. “What are you yelling for?”

Pidge opened the window and climbed in, smirking. “Got you.”

The door opened and Hunk dragged Romelle in, his eyes blank, with her kicking and clawing. “I’m sorry,” she gasped, “They overpowered me, I’m sorry.”

Sendak frowned thoughtfully. “I didn’t think you knew her well enough to drag her into this. Anyone else I need to know about?”

Lance shook his head in despair. This was it. He was all out of cards. Nothing else to play.

Sendak walked towards Romelle, his face all cool efficiency. “We’ll have to move you up the schedule. Can’t have you running around telling everyone.”

As he passed Keith, Keith’s eyes flew open, and he surged upwards, bringing the top of his head into Sendak’s head.

“Got you,” he snarled.

Sendak roared, grabbing for Keith and managing to grab his arm. But he had to let go, because behind him, Shiro had slipped him into a stranglehold.

Lance gave a half-shocked, half-delighted laugh. “What?!”

Keith rammed into Hunk, making him stagger back. “Sorry, big guy.”

Romelle wrenched herself away, making an immediate beeline for Lance and Allura, her hands fumbling to untie the knots that held them. “I’m sorry,” she apologized again, “I was expecting them to be passive, but—”

Allura nodded thoughtfully. “Sendak must have reprogrammed them to be hostile, like Shiro. It’s alright, Romelle. You couldn’t have known that.”

Romelle managed to get Lance free, and he stood up, flexing his arms. Then Pidge cannoned into Romelle, knocking her away.

“Hey!” Lance started towards the two girls. Pidge jammed her finger into the soft foot behind Romelle’s ear, and the girl went limp, her eyes rolling back into her head. Lance tackled Pidge away, holding her arms steady.

Across the room Shiro still had Sendak in the headlock. “Just—pass—out!” he grunted as Sendak struggled. Sendak got up, ramming his back into the wall, and Shiro along with it.

Hunk threw Keith off of him and went for Allura. Lance released Pidge to go to her aid, which turned out to be a _huge _mistake, because Pidge took out the back of his knees like a stealth ninja, sitting on top of him. Lance put his hands up to his ears, unwilling to let Pidge do to him what she’d done to Romelle.

Zarkon’s chair started rolling out. Hunk picked up Allura’s chair and followed after him. “Take care of them,” Zarkon ordered Sendak, who was busy ramming Shiro into the wall again. Sendak nodded, but he was gasping for breath.

Lance shoved at Pidge, wriggling and squirming and generally making himself an annoying target to hold onto. He rocked especially hard and sat up, sending her into the desk. She dropped to the floor, unconscious, and Lance ran towards Sendak. Keith tossed him a taser that he’d pulled off of Hunk. It must have been Romelle’s. “Free Pidge.”

Sendak slammed Shiro into the wall again as Lance primed the taser and poked Pidge with it, making her twitch. Lance flinched. He knew that hurt. On the other side of the room, Shiro let go of Sendak, and Sendak turned the tables on him, grabbing him by the throat. Shiro gasped for air, clawing at the massive hand.

“Keith—” 

Keith hesitated at the door, looking between the fleeing Zarkon and Shiro, held captive by Sendak. “Lance, it’s up to you.” He ran towards Sendak, and it hit Lance like a thunderbolt that he was the only one who could help Allura and stop Zarkon. He was the only one open.

“Oh, _geeze_!”

Lance ran for the door, chasing after Zarkon and Hunk as they headed towards the L wing.

Who had thought it was a good idea to make _him _the hero?!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did, Lance, and it was a BRILLIANT idea


	19. Chapter 19

Keith hit Sendak like a cannonball, kicking and punching. Sendak barely seemed to notice him, completely intent on strangling Shiro.

_No, no, no_!

Keith had barely managed to reach the taser in time. He’d been on the verge of passing out when his foot had found the taser, and he’d kicked it as hard as he could into Shiro’s feet. The shock had jolted him enough that he’d dropped Keith, and Keith had managed to grab the taser and zap him.

They’d come up with the plan to make it look like Shiro was still under the mind-control and trick Sendak and Zarkon. And it had _worked_. Mostly. It hadn’t gone _quite _how they’d planned: Keith had thought that Romelle would succeed, and he hadn’t thought that Allura would be there—he’d figured she’d get the prisoners to safety.

But now—all of the planning was coming unraveled. Lance had the taser. Sendak didn’t seem like he was going to drop Shiro any time soon.

Keith tugged on Sendak’s arm as Shiro’s face turned blue, but the behemoth man didn’t seem to budge an inch. So Keith resorted to dirty fighting.

He bit Sendak’s hand.

_Hard_.

That got his attention.

He dropped Shiro with a howl, turning his full attention on Keith. Keith gulped. _Whoops_. He sucker-punched Sendak in the stomach, then darted away. On the floor, Shiro coughed and gasped in air, and Sendak turned back towards him.

Keith threw the chair Lance had been tied to at Sendak. “HEY! I think _I’m _a bigger problem!”

Sendak turned back towards him. “Are you in such a hurry to get hurt?”

Keith ducked as the big man grabbed for him and headbutted him in the stomach. “Yah!” He backed up again. If Sendak hit him, it was game over. He was _huge_, and a solid punch would probably knock Keith out cold. He’d have to settle for quick punches until Shiro could join back in the fight.

Sendak charged towards him, swinging his right fist. Keith dodged to the left, and Sendak’s left fist caught him in the side. Little starbursts of pain shot through his ribs, and he heard a little cracking noise. He skidded to the ground, holding his side.

_That was such an easy feint, too_.

Sendak came in for another hit, and Keith scrambled backwards until his back hit a wall.

_Not good_.

He lunged to the side, barely avoiding a vicious kick.

_Bigger opponent, what do I do_?!

Sendak lunged, and Keith rolled, going right through Sendak’s legs and coming out the other side. He grabbed a heavy paperweight off of Zarkon’s desk and slammed it into Sendak’s head as hard as he could, hard enough to make his fingers hurt. He dropped the paperweight, shaking his hand.

Sendak stumbled back, dazed, his good eye unfocused. Keith backed away, his legs wobbling. He couldn’t keep moving like this for much longer.

Shiro seemed to be recovering, his face returning to a normal color. Keith edged away from him, still keeping himself in-between Shiro and Sendak.

“You… rat…” Sendak growled, holding a hand to his head. “I…” He growled, suddenly seeming very gorilla-like.

On the ground, Pidge stirred, looking up in confusion. “Oh,” she said simply, “The records—he has AB positive blood.” She drooped back down to the floor.

Sendak _picked up the desk_, which had to weigh at least fifty pounds—it was a solid wooden desk. “I was the first to receive genetic changes,” he snarled, “You—can’t—defeat me!”

Sendak heaved the desk at Keith, who barely had time to think _oh, hell_, before it hit him.

Behind him, at the same instant Sendak threw the desk, Shiro started to move.

Xxx

Lance bolted after Hunk and Zarkon. For a guy in a motorized wheelchair, Zarkon sure moved fast. They’d made it to the L wing by the time Lance caught up.

“Gah—agh,” Lance panted, opening the door. Hunk was waiting for him, Allura tied up behind him. “Buddy, I don’t want to fight you.”

Hunk marched towards him, expression blank.

“Argh—okay. Fine. If it has to be this way.”

Lance primed the taser, lunging forwards. With speed Lance _never _would have anticipated from Hunk, Hunk moved to the side, grabbed his arm and _twisted_. The taser fell to the ground.

“I could break your arm,” Hunk told him flatly. It wasn’t a threat. Just a statement. He swung Lance’s arm, ramming him into the wall. “You’re not Keith, Lance. You can’t take a beating. Just give up.”

Lance tried for a winning smile, even as his world spun and throbbed. “Nah, can’t. I don’t really want to be a zombie again. It kind of sucked. Allura, heads up!” He pushed Hunk as hard as he could backwards, and Hunk stumbled.

Allura stuck her legs out, and Hunk tripped over them as he backpedaled. He landed on the ground _hard_, and Lance scooped the taser up.

“I’m sorry, but you’ll feel a lot better after this.” He primed the taser and shocked Hunk with it. Hunk jerked once, twice, and then went still, his eyes rolled back in his head. Lance shuddered, untying Allura. “Thanks for the assist.”

“Any time.” She rubbed feeling back into her arms. “Zarkon kept monologuing down the hallway. If he manages to get his serum—the effects will be almost instantaneous. He’ll regain full use of his body very quickly.”

Lance gulped. “We’d better move fast, then.”

Allura shook her head. “_You _need to move fast.”

“What? Aren’t you coming?!”

“Lance, I’m sorry, but I have to find Lotor. He’s scared, and alone, and he might hurt himself or someone else. I’ve got to find him and make sure he’s okay.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“No, it can’t. I’m sorry, Lance, but I’ve got to protect the other students.”

Lance sucked in a deep breath. “Okay. I understand.”

Allura gave him a grateful smile and bounded off down the hallway. Lance watched her go, then turned back to the hallway.

“Ready or not, here I come.”

Xxx

Shiro darted around, lunging for Sendak the moment he threw the desk. He tackled the big man—whatever he was now—and punched him in the face.

With his metal prosthetic.

“Bedtime for you,” he muttered as Sendak finally—_finally_—passed out. He whipped around, breathing hard. “Keith?”

There was no answer. Shiro bolted towards the desk, trying to haul it up. Romelle and Pidge joined him.

“I’m sorry I didn’t help you fight,” Romelle told him as she shoved at the desk, “I thought I might just be a liability.”

Shiro barely heard her through the roaring in his ears. _Let him be okay, let him be okay, let him be okay_—

They finally got the desk up, and Romelle let go, ducking down and dragging Keith out from underneath it. Pidge slipped to the mess on the floor from the desk, riffling through it. Shiro let the desk fall with a _thump _and rushed to Romelle, taking Keith from her.

“Keith? Keith, buddy, wake up!”

Keith’s eyes fluttered open, and Shiro’s heart skipped a beat in relief. “Ow…” Keith muttered.

Shiro hugged him tightly. “Don’t _scare _me like that!”

Keith squeaked in pain, and Shiro released him. “Where does it hurt?”

“Um… everywhere,” Keith croaked. His eyes started to slide shut again. “Tired…”

“It’s okay,” Shiro promised, “You’re going to be fine.”

Keith started to shake, tears leaking out of unfocused eyes. “Shi-ro?”

“I’m right here, buddy.”

“I wanna go home,” Keith choked, “I—” He closed his eyes, gulping. “It hurts, Shiro!”

Shiro winced. “Okay. Okay, buddy. You go to sleep, okay? We’ll get you to a doctor soon—a _good _doctor.”

“K-kay.”

Romelle gently draped a jacket over Keith, then bounced over to Pidge, who was typing away at a computer. “What are you doing?”

Pidge bit her lip, tapping her fingers aimlessly on the keys. “Mmm. Zarkon has access to the security cameras, of course, but he also has access to some kind of school-wide communicator.”

Shiro left the now-asleep Keith to look at the screen. “What are you doing with it?”

Pidge blinked like it should be obvious. “I’m making a school-wide broadcast connected to the L wing cameras, of course. The students are going to _flip _when they find out what’s going on.” She grinned, popping her knuckles. “Let the revolution begin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's this? An actual ending to this monstrosity? And so soon!


	20. Chapter 20

Lance didn’t have to search long to find Zarkon. That motorized wheelchair made a _lot_of noise. He took in a deep breath. “Oooookay. Here we go.”

He threw open the door, watching Zarkon inject himself with some reddish liquid. Lance raced across the room, primed the taser, and jammed it into Zarkon’s neck. He reeled back as the acrid smell of burning flesh hit his nostrils and Zarkon screamed an unholy screech, dropping limp.

Lance let out a deep breath. “Hah. Okay. Uh… okay.” He didn’t hear any more rasping from Zarkon. “Oh my stars, I _killed _him!”

Lance ran to the trash can in the room, heaving. He’d killed someone. _Killed _him. Sure, he’d been an awful guy, but _still_!

Something rasped behind him, and he whirled around. Zarkon was moving. He hadn’t killed him after all!

Oh, stars. He hadn’t killed him!

Zarkon ripped out all of the IV lines attached to him, rising shakily to his feet. “Hrmmmmm. It’s… strange.”

Lance screamed, running out the door and slamming it shut, locking it tight. “Hoooly stars. Holy stars. Holy stars. What _is_that?!”

Zarkon pounded on the glass of a window, making Lance jump. “Argh!”

Zarkon pounded again, and a spiderweb of a crack appeared in the glass.

“Oooooohhhhhhhh, stars, he can get out! He can _get out_!”

Zarkon pounded again, the crack spreading. Lance backed away, and one more pounding burst the glass. Lance turned and bolted, running into an unused lab. He could see old chemicals in their droppers, and he grabbed the ones that had the “flammable” label on them, splashing them on the floor in front of the door and grabbing a lighter.

“Okay, okay, okay, we’re doing this. Okay.”

Zarkon ripped the door off of its hinges, and Lance yelped.

“Holy crow, what did you pump into yourself!”

He fumblingly lit the lighter and set the flame in the puddle of chemicals. Fire whooshed up, engulfing Zarkon in flames and singeing Lance’s eyebrows. Zarkon screeched another inhuman screech, and tumbled out of the flames. Lance scrambled backwards as the flaming corpse ambled towards him.

Lance shrieked. Loud and long. The flames licked at the walls as Zarkon batted out the flames on his body, lunging for Lance and swatting him.

It felt like a bag of bricks had been swung into him, knocking all of his breath out and sending him flying into the wall. Lance slumped to the floor, dazed. His hand fell on his pocket, where the taser was, and he jammed it into Zarkon’s leg as Zarkon moved in for the kill.

Zarkon swore loudly and fell on top of Lance, wrapping his meaty hands around Lance’s throat. Lance kicked him in the stomach, wriggling out from underneath him and looking for a way out. He threw open a window, but Zarkon grabbed him by his shirt collar, dragging him back, throwing him to the floor and kicking him in the ribs. Lance gasped, stars dancing in front of his vision.

Zarkon put one foot on Lance’s chest and started to step down. Lance shoved fruitlessly at the foot, gasping for air. He hit the leg, _hard_, and Zarkon kicked him in the head in retaliation. Everything went fuzzy, yellow and orange flames everywhere. Zarkon stepped on his ribcage again, and something went _crack_.

There was a loud snarl, and then Zarkon was flying backwards, something clawing and kicking and biting him.

Lotor. The ex-class president showed no mercy, pummeling every part of Zarkon he could reach. Zarkon threw him off and into a table, but Lotor bounced up like it was nothing, rebounding to attack him again.

Lance coughed, eyes watering from the smoke. Zarkon and Lotor disappeared in and out of view as they disappeared behind walls of flame and smokescreens. Lance rolled over, trying to push himself up, but he was dizzy, and nothing seemed to work right. Flames crackled everywhere, the heat blistering on his face.

“Lance!” A figure with white hair emerged from the flames, kneeling down next to him, a scarf tied over her face. “Lance, can you stand?”

“Are you an angel?” he asked dreamily. Why was everything so _blurry_?!

Allura bit her lip, hooking her arms under his and dragging him towards the door. “Lotor!” she called desperately, “Come on! We have to get out of here, the whole wing is threatening collapse!”

There was no answer, only a yowl of anger from further down the hallway and the pattering of feet. Zarkon howled one more time, and then the only sound was the crackling of the flames. Allura shook her head, dragging Lance towards the L wing door. Lance’ vision faded in and out. It went black, and when the world reasserted itself, they were outside the L wing, and Mr. Coran was holding Allura back as the L wing’s walls and ceilings caved in.

“LOTOR!”

The last thing that Lance saw before he blacked out was Allura with tears streaming down her face.

Xxx

“—sh—”

“—Think he’s waking up—”

“—so _boring_—”

Lance’s eyes opened slowly, and when they did, Pidge was right in his face, Hunk and Allura behind her. “You’re awake!”

“Uh-huh.” Everything felt sluggish and slow, like he had cotton wrapped around his brain, and his arms were wrapped in bandages, matching bandages on his face. “Hi.”

“You missed a _lot_,” Hunk told him cheerfully.

“Mhm?

“You’ve got a concussion,” Pidge informed him.

“Lovely.” That explained a lot.

“And broken ribs,” Hunk offered, “And some minor burning.”

“Ah.” That explained all of the bandages.

“You _missed _it!” Pidge complained, “There was a glorious student revolution that _I _caused and led, and you _missed _it!”

“Very sorry,” Lance agreed, “What?”

“Pidge pulled up a _whoooooole _lot of feeds from the L wing and put them on a schoolwide broadcast,” Hunk explained.

Pidge grinned beatifically. “It was _beautiful_. Imagine every screen in the school just suddenly fizzing to the feeds of Florona and Plaxum and Lotor being experimented on, and then the three of us getting brainwashed. The entire student body plus Mr. Coran _flipped_. And they came to the office, and they nearly lynched Sendak, but Shiro stopped them and then I led them in a glorious revolution to rescue Florona and Plaxum—they’re okay, by the way, your little fire didn’t boil them alive. Oh, and we rescued Hunk and then _Lotor _showed up _out of nowhere_, and went bolting into the fire, and Allura came tearing after him, calling for him to wait, and then we heard all of this screaming, and then Allura dragged you out of the fire, and then the L wing collapsed and it was _awesome_!”

“Okay,” Lance agreed, “What about Sendak?”

“He’s been arrested. Yeah, he got arrested, and a helicopter came to take you and Keith to the hospital—he got pinned under a giant desk, by the way, but the doctor said he’ll be fine, just, like, some minor fractures and stuff. Shiro’s with him. Anyway, it was a pretty wild day. The L wing is history. Burned down for realsies this time. Turns out, most of the teachers went into shock after all of this. Mr. Coran was the only one who, like, did anything, all of the other teachers just kind of sat around wringing their hands and saying how horrible it all was.”

“Huh.”

“Okay, enough,” Allura said firmly, shooing Hunk and Pidge out. “Go bother Keith. Lance needs to not be bombarded right now, okay?” She shut the door and turned to Lance with a watery smile. “The doctors said you’ll be okay with time.”

“Okay. Good. Uh…”

Tears bloomed in her blue eyes. “Lotor was in there. When it collapsed. He never came out, and—” She gulped. “They found Zarkon’s body, but they can’t find Lotor’s. They can’t find him _anywhere_.”

“He survived, then,” Lance said firmly, “He’s out there. He’s hiding because… well, he’s a purple elf creature with glowing eyes, and that’s not exactly normal. But he’s alive. If they don’t have a body, he’s alive.”

Allura wiped at her eyes. “I found him hiding in an empty classroom. When I mentioned that Zarkon was in the L wing…” She shook her head. “He took off running. He was so _angry_, Lance, at what Zarkon did to him.”

“He had every right to be. And he saved my life.”

Allura nodded, sniffing. “I know. I know, but I just… Ugh. I don’t know. I feel so confused! The board offered Shiro the position of principal. I thought they would shut down the school after this, but they decided it could still work.”

Lance nodded sleepily. He was so _tired_!

“I’ve been re-offered my position as student dean. I’m taking it. The police—they said that you could leave and go back home. If you want to.”

“Mmm?”

Allura gave him a slight smile. “You don’t have to decide right now. You look _exhausted_. I’ll leave you to sleep, okay?”

“’kay.” Lance’s eyes slid shut slowly.

“Good night.”

Xxx

Lance wrinkled his nose. “I don’t know. I think _I’m _hurt worse.”

Keith snorted. “I bet my concussion is worse than yours.” They were both outside, finally, after several days of hospitalization, at Allura’s insistence, sprawled on the school lawn with Pidge and Hunk.

“No _way_! I got _kicked in the head_!”

“A giant, solid wooden desk landed on me! I’ve got fractured bones. I think I win.”

“Smoke inhalation.”

“Pffffft. You’ll recover from that in no time. My leg and head have to be in plaster for a _month_.”

“My ribs are broken! Zarkon tried to _crush my ribcage_!”

“Giant. Desk. On my ribcage.”

“I got burned up!”

“Fractured. Bones.”

Lance settled into a glare. “Fractured bones won’t leave scars. Burns will.”

“Internal scars. Plus, by lip busted, and I got stitches. I think _I _was worse off.”

“Oh my stars,” Pidge broke in, rolling her eyes, “You were both horribly injured, we appreciate your sacrifice, now stop _arguing about it_!”

“Pffflblt. You’re just jealous because _you _spent most of the time brainwashed while _I _did all of the work.”

Keith snorted.

Lance sniffed. “I’m _sorry_, Keith, but I seem to recall keeping you from _bleeding __out _when you were shot and also rescuing your dumb face from getting rearranged into a bird. And then I seem to recall _stopping Zarkon _by _myself_. _Single-handedly_.”

“You mean that time when Zarkon nearly crushed your ribcage?” Keith asked innocently.

“Shut up.”

“And I believe that you spent a good chunk of _your_time being brainwashed,” Pidge cut in.

Lance blinked. “Oh—yeah—wait.” He slugged Keith in the arm. “_That _is for pushing me into a taser.”

“I wish I could take credit for doing that, but it was actually an accident. That time.” Keith stretched, wincing. “Whatever happened to all of the doctors in the L wing?”

Lance shrugged. “Turns out, according to Sendak, most of them were also brainwashed, so they’re free now.”

Keith made an unhappy noise. “Great. So they got off scot-free?”

“I wouldn’t call it scot-free,” Hunk said softly, “They have to live with their consciences.”

Romelle walked towards them. “Hey! The police are done with Allura and Shiro. They want Keith now.”

Keith propped himself up on crutches, struggling up to his feet. “I can do it myself,” he snapped when Romelle offered him a hand. Lance shook his head. Some things would never change.

Keith swung his way to the building. It was only a few minutes before he was swinging out again, his face red and stormy. “They want Lance,” he spat, lowering himself back down.

Hunk blinked in alarm. “Whoa—what happened?”

“They—rrrrrgh—they were implying—you know what, you’ll find out. I can’t say it, I’ll punch something.”

Lance stood up, frowning, and made his way to Allura’s office, where the police officers were waiting.

“Sit down, please.”

Lance did, kicking his feet idly, and noting a black eye on one of the officers that seemed recent.

“Ms. Allura, Mr. Shiro and Mr. Kogane have given us their statements. They said that Zarkon was trying to… convert students into some kind of animal hybrid?”

Lance nodded. “That’s right.”

“And you lit the fire?”

“Ehhhhh… yeah. I wasn’t, like, trying to burn the L wing down. I just—Zarkon was chasing me, and I was trying to keep him away. Sorry.”

“Mmmhm. Do you know what the symptoms of mass hysteria are?”

“No. Why?” Lance blinked. “Oh—hey, whoa, you don’t think that we imagined it all, do you?!”

They officers looked at each other cautiously. “We can’t rule it out as a possibility.”

Suddenly, Keith’s bad mood made a _lot _more sense. So did the one officer’s black eye. “It _happened_,” Lance said hotly, “Zarkon brainwashed me, and he _definitely _was doing experimentation on other students!”

“Yes, on his own son, supposedly. Who conveniently cannot be found.”

Lance flushed. “He was—I—we’re not _crazy_! We _saw _it! It _happened_! I’m not a liar!”

“No, of course not,” the officer with the black eye soothed, “We know you’re telling us exactly what you believed you saw. Now, for the rest of this—”

Anger flooded through Lance. “You wanted a statement?! Fine, here’s my statement. Kids _died _here, this school has brainwashed other kids and you just _kept sending people here_, even when they disappeared mysteriously! So here’s my statement: when you get to Hell, say hi to Zarkon for me!” 

Lance whirled around and flounced out, slamming the door shut. He marched right back outside. “I can’t _believe _them!”

Keith glared at the school. “_Mass hysteria_. I should show them the _mass hysteria _chain scars on my wrists! Or the _mass hysteria _fish girls currently in the swimming pool!”

“Did you give him the black eye?”

“Yes.”

“_Good_.”

“And you?” Hunk asked timidly, “How did you react?”

A small smile crept across Lance’s face. “I told him he was going to hell.”

Keith let out a sharp bark of laughter, and Hunk groaned, covering his face. “Please tell me that’s not actually what you said!”

“That’s the gist of it.”

Keith smirked. “That’s _awesome_.” He snorted, shaking his head to himself. “_Mass hysteria_.”

Pidge raised an eyebrow. “I think they might reconsider their offer to let you two leave the school if that’s how you behave.”

Keith shrugged. “I was planning on staying anyway.”

Pidge stared at him. “_Really_? After everything that happened to you, you’d want to _stay_?

Keith shrugged. “It’s kind of grown on me, and I want to stick with Shiro anyway. He beats foster care anytime. Besides, no matter how bad it’s been, at least you can’t say it’s been boring.”

Lance wrinkled his nose. He thought he saw a flash of purple and white out of the corner of his vision, and he stared towards the trees where he’d seen it, trying to find the source. But whatever—or _whoever_—it was—had gone.

“No,” he agreed, still watching the trees, “It’s _never _boring.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end. Wow, for once my brain didn't go "look at THIS shiny idea" in the middle of the fiction. Yikes. I might actually have to go back to writing the things on hiatus, ha.


End file.
